Rule 52
by Gixxer Pilot
Summary: Star Trek: 2009 Cop!Verse AU cross with NCIS. During a blizzard that traps two of NCIS' finest in Iowa City, Jim Kirk and Leonard McCoy learn a new meaning for the phrase 'interagency cooperation', courtesy of Tony DiNozzo and Ziva David.
1. Chapter 1

**Title**: Rule 52

**Author**: Gixxer Pilot

**Beta**: Wicked Jade

**Summary**: Star Trek: 2009 Cop!Verse AU cross with NCIS. During a blizzard that traps two of NCIS' finest in Iowa City, Jim Kirk and Leonard McCoy learn a new meaning for the phrase 'interagency cooperation', courtesy of Tony DiNozzo and Ziva David.

**Author's Notes**: This story is Space_Case_Writer13's fault. Simple as that. She poked and prodded and whined and moaned, and because I'm a total pushover, I caved. Well, okay, so that's secondary. Really, I've wanted to stick Kirk and DiNozzo in the same room to see what may or may not explode since I started this AU of mine. Can you blame me? As far as this story's purpose, well that's not so exact. All I know is that I started with the intention that it was just going to be something quick and fun. But then awesome betas are awesome, and the more Wicked Jade and I talked, the more this story grew. (Thank you, Jade!) So, _this _one is not a full case file, but rather set up for another, bigger Trek AU/NCIS story.

Hmm. Spoilers. For NCIS, anything up through season eight is fair game, which is about when this story is set. As far as the Cop!verse AU is concerned, this one sits around the Accidentally on Purpose timeframe. You shouldn't have to read the all of the AU to get what's going on here, but it would be helpful. As always, comments are loved (if you feel like giving them). I hope you enjoy it!

**Disclaimer**: Here's the skinny: if you recognize it as something someone has, at one point or another, paid money to see, own or otherwise indulge, it's not mine. I also make no money from writing. Please don't sue me.

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><p><strong>Chapter 1<strong>

_Washington, D.C._

"Tony, what are you doing?"

DiNozzo's hands paused in mid air, hovering innocently over the keyboard. He looked up in time to see Ziva to drape herself over his left shoulder while she predictably radiated disapproval from under her dark brows. Smirking, Tony returned his concentration to the screen, rubbed his hands together in anticipation and answered, "Just exercising my brilliance, Ziva. Why do you ask?"

The former Mossad officer narrowed her eyes and pointed one of her deadly fingers toward the smattering of thumbnail images all over DiNozzo's desktop. She squinted, trying to identify the subject of the photo. "Is that not a photograph of McGee's car?" Her head shifted as she looked at the URL and the page's format. After a couple of seconds of contemplation, Ziva's eyes lit up while the seasoned investigator in her put all the pieces together. "Are you posting an ad, offering McGee's car for sale on Craigslist?"

"Very astute! See, I knew there was a reason we hired you as an NCIS agent," DiNozzo replied with his trademarked million-watt smile on his face.

"Where is McGee, by the way?" Ziva asked, looking toward Tim's empty desk while she completely ignored DiNozzo's insult.

"Up with the Director, working out a new type of security encryption to protect the highest level documents in NCIS' database," Tony answered. "So if you're really asking, 'Will he back soon?' the answer is no."

"Good. Carry on."

"You approve of this, Ziva David? Now I know you're becoming more American," DiNozzo said, plopping his feet up on his desk. He interlaced his fingers and rested them behind his neck while he regarded the Israeli curiously. "A few years ago, you would have been threatening to kill me eighteen ways with a single paperclip if I even thought about a little Probie-Wan-Kenobi hazing, and now," DiNozzo paused dramatically, "You're almost encouraging it."

"Don't say that too loudly, Tony. Someone might hear you," Ziva said with a smile before she causally leaned on DiNozzo's shoulder. "And besides, times have changed."

Tony simply scoffed before he re-addressed the task before him. There was nothing more important (at least not right now) than properly pranking his co-worker, and it deserved nothing short of his best effort. "Now I just have to figure out what I want the ad to say." DiNozzo spun in his chair, and grabbed his famed Mighty Mouse stapler off his desk and tapped the brightly colored office utensil against his cheek while he thought. With a sinister smile, he set it back on the desk and rested his fingers along the keyboard, typing his message into the text box slowly and deliberately.

Ziva bit down a grin and leaned in closer to inspect the ad her partner was busy composing. Reading off the screen, she allowed a small squeak of a chuckle to escape her lips when she saw, _'For sale – one immaculately maintained and nerd-driven BMW Z3. Never abused (because the owner doesn't know how), always washed, stored during the winter, and waxed nightly with a diaper. All original service records going back to the factory's purchase of every nut and bolt will be included, applicable only if the buyer speaks German or Geek. (No, there is not a missing 'R' there – it's supposed to say 'Geek'.) If interested, please contact Tim at 202-555-5272 for a test ride, a date, or both.' _Angling her head toward her partner, Ziva said, "This is good. I think it is fitting for what you are trying to accomplish."

DiNozzo twisted his head back toward Ziva. His nose bumped the Star of David dangling from her neck. Surprised, Tony recoiled in the opposite direction, banging his leg loudly against the underside of his desk. He let out a high-pitched and somewhat girly squeak as pain flared through his leg, blossoming from his knee and spreading in waves. Tightly, he pushed out a pinched, "It's okay. Nobody get up. I'm good."

"That did not sound like it was very pleasurable," Ziva said with a slight wince.

"Thanks for the support there, partner," Tony replied in a much more normal voice as he rubbed away at the sore contact point of his leg. Exhaling a long breath, he motioned with his head back toward his computer screen with the yet-to-be-posted Craigslist ad. "Do you have anything to add?" he asked as he stuck a ludicrously low price on the car to ensure as many annoying calls to McGee's phone as humanely possible.

"No," she replied, pursing her lips and shaking her head. Ziva's long braid swooshed gently back and forth as she regarded the screen. "I think, for once, you have covered everything. And it even makes sense. I'm proud, Tony."

"Hey! Whose first language is English here?" DiNozzo exclaimed, splaying his left arm out at his side while he clicked the 'post' command on the webpage.

"I have never said your English was good, only that it is better than mine," Ziva answered, perching herself on the edge of DiNozzo's desk. She reached in the drawer and pulled out the package of Doritos he'd hidden in there after lunch ad popped the bag open. She stuffed a couple of the triangle chips in her mouth, crunching loudly to get Tony's attention. With a series of quick and deliberate motions, she expertly kept the snack away from its rightful owner, reveling in satisfaction as DiNozzo grew more frustrated with each unsuccessful swipe. "Your reactions are late. You must anticipate. Lead the target."

DiNozzo was about to open his mouth to protest when a whoosh of air and a lightning quick hand snatched the small bag out of Ziva's delicate but deadly grasp. Gibbs' shadow flashed past, the bag of Doritos crumpled in his big palm. The team leader dropped the ruined snack into the garbage can next to his desk, stowed his gun and sat down, all in one fluid, silent motion. He looked up toward his two agents in the bullpen and asked, "Anyone ever tell you it's not nice to tease the animals, David?"

"Of course," she responded, spinning gracefully over one foot before she walked back toward her own desk. Ziva sat down and popped in her password to her computer out of force of habit. She looked across the bullpen and caught her boss' eyes. Smirking, she added, "But only if there are actually animals here to tease in the first place."

Gibbs' silver eyebrows jumped up and down. "Mmm. Good point."

Tony growled silently, opening his email to find the waiting Craigslist announcement in his inbox. He clicked on the link and checked over his posting, complete with pictures of McGee's car. Satisfied, he clicked on the 'post' button and sat back, twiddling his fingers manically in a nice homage to Mr. Burns.

The sterile 'ding' of the elevator doors that announced the arrival of another person to the party did little to prepare the team for the hurricane that was Abby Sciuto. Her black pigtails bounced wildly on her shoulders while she teetered toward the middle of the bullpen. The random assortment of buckles attached to her five inch platform boots jingled loudly, as did the other assortment of chains and spikes sprinkled about her body. Abby's face lit up as soon as she saw Gibbs, and she made a beeline for him as fast as her footwear would allow. "Gibbs!" she called. "GibbsGibbsGibbs!"

Gibbs raised his eyes from the stack of 'bureaucratic bullshit' paperwork he was finally forcing himself to do, meeting the expectant face of the forensic tech. She stopped in front of him, bouncing in place on the balls of her feet while he silently tilted his head to the side. Lifting one silver eyebrow, he asked, "How many Caff-Pows have you had today, Abby?"

"Just three, but only because my doctor yelled at me at my last physical about my caffeine intake. So I actually spread it out over the course of the last three hours, instead of slamming them like I normally do. It's like doing shots, except it's caffeine and not alcohol, and it's probably not good for me to drink so much so fast, even if helps me focus," she spit out in a rush while she began to pace back and forth in front of Gibbs' desk. Her hands gesticulated wildly through the air as she talked, brows furrowed while her mouth raced away.

The longtime NCIS agent sighed. Grabbing her gently by her shoulders, Gibbs guided Abby down into his chair. Speaking softly, slowly and quietly, he said, "Talk to me, Abby. Why are you up here?"

Her posture deflated. "Giiibbs!" she whined. "I am so bored down here, and I am going crazy. Can you find me something to do that's not ten pounds of lame? In the last week, I've cleaned my lab twice, recalibrated every machine five times, organized my office, and digitized every single thing in forensics. Like, why isn't anyone committing any crimes? Not that I want people to commit crimes, because if we're involved, that usually means someone is dead or hurt or missing and that's bad, so I guess-"

"Abby," he scolded gently. "Get to the point."

She took a breath. "Sorry. Being cooped up and bored is not a good thing for me." Abby stood and grabbed the remote for the plasmas off McGee's vacant desk.

"Apparently," Ziva added before she stood to get a better view of the screen. She stopped shoulder to shoulder with Gibbs and Tony, at the same time earning a little glare from the crack forensic specialist. One well-tanned hand came up in apology. "Sorry, Abby. We are all less than occupied right now, and it is seems to be affecting us all in different ways."

"Accepted," Abby answered. Smiling brightly through the blood red lipstick, she added, "But I actually found something useful for you guys to do." She snapped her head left and brought up her right hand. Clicking once, the machine obeyed with a beep while it gave her the pre-loaded image. An evidence picture of several small packages of various illicit drugs popped up on the screen, all stuffed neatly into a small section of the fuselage of a C-130 for clandestine transport. "Like I said, I ran out of stuff to do down in my lab because no one is committing any crimes. And a girl can only make so many black snowflakes before it gets really, really boring. Like, really boring. So I started running fingerprints of all our active BOLOs and cases in the various law enforcement systems from around the country."

"And you got a hit," Gibbs supplied, almost relieved his team might have something more productive to do than clean their desks for the fourth time that week.

"You know it," Abby said with a triumphant smile.

"Who?" Ziva asked.

"Remember Melvin Jenkins?" Abby said, pressing the button on the remote. It beeped compliantly and brought up another picture, this time a military ID for one Seaman Melvin Jenkins. She pressed a second button to bring up Jenkins' service records while the team re-familiarized themselves with the old case.

The face that stared back at the group of NCIS agents was, in a word, unremarkable. Melvin Jenkins was an unassuming and unimposing man in his late twenties; he was, by all accounts from his superiors, categorically substandard, though never a discipline problem. He wasn't willing to try, nor was he willing to go the extra mile to get the job done perfectly, but his work was adequate. His ability to fly under the radar, along with his station on the serving line in the galley (and subsequent and daily access to the entire crew's compliment), were the two most basic and deciding factors his supplies used when they chose him for the job. And it probably would have taken a much longer amount of time for the ship's Agent Afloat and MPs to catch up to Jenkins, had he not accidentally dumped an entire shipment of PCP into the clam chowder after 'sampling' the product he was supposed to be selling. The consumption caused mass hallucinations for nearly two-thirds of the ship's crew, including the _Kitty Hawk's_ XO and CAG.

Gibbs thought, analyzing the data on the screen. "Yeah, we busted him last year. He was that idiot distributor for a small-time drug ring on the _Kitty Hawk_. I thought he was in jail."

"He was supposed to be, but I guess he flipped on his supplier in return for a lighter sentence in a cushier, lighter security, and more importantly, civilian prison. After he got to Leavenworth, he decided that it wasn't as much fun as the movies make it out to be, I guess," Abby said with a shrug. "It's nice they tell us these things, I know. Anyway, the brilliant prosecutor thought it would be an equally brilliant idea to let Jenkins out ROR until the trial was set to start, and you'll never guess what happened after that."

"He never showed," Gibbs stated rhetorically.

"Nope. And when he didn't show up, all the charges against the supplier had to be dropped because Jenkins was the state's star witness. More importantly, he was the only one who could link the supplier to the _Kitty Hawk, _so we don't know what else went on during that cruise. I was able to access the case notes from what was prepared for the trial, and Jenkins apparently told the prosecutor that NCIS only hit the tip of the iceberg, and he was ready to name names," she said, clicking through the rest of the notes she was able to recover.

Ziva pursed her lips. "He got cold shoes."

Tony rolled his eyes and spun dramatically toward his partner. "Feet, Ziva. The correct term is, 'He got cold feet.' You're an American citizen now. You should know these things. Mistakes like that are grounds for revocation," DiNozzo corrected.

Gibbs turned his head toward the senior field agent and simply glared.

No matter how long Tony worked for Gibbs, the singularly most intense glare in the Western hemisphere would always be something to which DiNozzo would never find immunity. Mouth forming into a little 'O', Tony snapped his mouth closed in mid word. "Sorry boss. Focusing."

"Very good, DiNozzo." To Abby, Gibbs asked, "Have there been any sightings on this guy since then?"

"None at all. Like, he went completely underground and off the grid as soon as he was out of prison. No records of any movement from his bank accounts, no credit card transactions, no cell phone, nothing. Something's got him spooked, Gibbs. Big time. So, it's not surprising that he's been in the wind ever since," she concluded, turning on her heel to face her NCIS team members. "Until now."

DiNozzo was on the fence whether he should be afraid of the dark and satisfied look on Abby's face, or if he should be proud of it. Tony decided silently on the latter before he asked, "So where did you find him, Abbs?"

Abby pressed the final button which brought up a recent mugshot of Melvin Jenkins and a Google maps image. Smirking, she said, "Iowa City, Iowa."

Gibbs' eyebrows shot to his hairline. "Iowa City? What the hell is he doing there?"

"Is there anything there, other than cornfields and cows?" DiNozzo snorted out.

Abby shrugged. "Well, I guess if you're going to hide, what better place to do it than in the middle of nowhere?"

"Iowa City isn't exactly 'nowhere'," Gibbs corrected. "It's not a big town, but it's not Stillwater, Pennsylvania, either."

"Okay, you win on that one. But big town or not, he did a really good job of it for the past eight months. I mean, even the FBI didn't have a clue where he was," Abby said, pulling up the FBI's field report on the plea bargain and the unknown whereabouts of one Melvin Jenkins.

"That's not a surprise," DiNozzo snorted out. "It's the FBI. Come on. Look at Fornell, Boss. He still can't find his ass, and it's attached to his body. Par for the course, I guess."

"How was he caught?" Ziva asked, scrutinizing the data on the screen.

Abby pressed another button that populated an arrest report to the screen. "Stupidly. Though, it wasn't surprising, given how he got himself caught dealing in the first place. That was the caveat. According to their reports, Jenkins' superiors said he was a non-issue for discipline unless he'd been drinking. He must have behaved himself for most of the time while he was on the lam, but in Iowa, he managed to start a bar fight at a local establishment in Riverside, The Stumble Inn. The owner is retired Army, and a few of the cops from Iowa City are regular patrons. Okay, this guy is dumb. Like, dumb, dumb. When the bartender cut him off, Jenkins took exception and he decided that it would be smart idea to fight a sergeant and his partner who'd intervened on the bartender's behalf. Both cops were there for dinner after work and were, more importantly, both sober."

"I'm guessing that didn't go very well for Melvin," Tony supplied, laughing at the idea of Jenkins getting his ass handed to him by two trained police officers.

"No." Abby pressed another button and put up two service pictures from the Iowa City PD on the screen. "Officer Kirk and his FTO-turned-permanent-partner, Sergeant McCoy, did not take kindly to Jenkins' drunken antics. They subdued him, took him to the drunk tank, booked him, and he's been stewing there since last night while he slept it off."

DiNozzo, half-listening to Abby's narrative, studied the two faces on the screen. Kirk's young face and bright blue eyes practically jumped off the screen while screaming 'mischievous little bastard' in big, bold letters, but DiNozzo's attention went to the slightly more demure picture of the older, more experienced (and most certainly crabbier) sergeant. He snorted. "Wow. Look at that scowl on McCoy's face. Boss, he might even give you a run for your money," Tony said, lightly tapping Gibbs on the upper arm.

The team leader reciprocated with an equally fierce scowl as the one on the plasma, but added in a shot to the back of DiNozzo's head for good measure. Without missing a beat, Gibbs asked, "Has anyone talked to the Iowa City PD about this?"

"Not to my knowledge. I don't think they even uploaded his prints into AFIS yet."

"So how did you find him?" Gibbs queried.

Abby looked contrite. She fiddled with the seam of the remote for the plasma while she said, "In the last couple of stupid boring days, I may or may not have designed a sniffer program with some of McGee's platforms to search police databases for files and prints not uploaded to the national registry."

"So, you hacked the country's police departments? I am impressed," Ziva said, drawing out the words of her second sentence while she smiled approvingly.

Tony's face split into a wide grin. "Way to go McAbby! Make good use of that extra time!" he exclaimed, lifting his hand for a fist bump from the forensics expert. Gibbs and Ziva turned and gaped in Abby's general direction, both looking pleased but doing their best not to show it.

Abby shirked back when she saw the two intense but amused gazes of Gibbs and Ziva pointed her direction. "What? Stop staring at me like that. I can't just like, do nothing. That would suck," she responded as innocently as possible.

"Looks like we're going to fetch," Gibbs said, spinning on his heel.

In his head, Tony silently prayed. '_Please don't pick me. Please don't pick me_.' He let his eyes slide over toward his boss, hopeful that he was transmitting positive energy waves in Gibbs' direction. If there was anything he didn't want to do, it was go to Iowa. Scrubbing the mats of the NCIS gym with a toothbrush was bound to be more pleasurable than a road trip the middle of God's Arctic Asscrack, where there was probably more snow than the North Pole, with people who had funny accents and ate weird food. No, it would be much better to stay in D.C., even if he was bored off his ass.

Gibbs strode back over to his desk. He picked up the phone and barked, "McGee! Get your ass down here. We have a case."

'_Thank God_,' DiNozzo thought, exhaling in blessed relief as he sat down at his desk. He pulled up his email and pretended to work while he half-listened to Gibbs' phone conversation. He learned early on that anticipation was nine-tenths of the law when working with Leroy Jethro Gibbs, and DiNozzo felt sorry for McGee as he thought about what his boss was about to tell the younger agent.

Well, almost. The thought did at least cross his mind, which was a step in the right direction.

McGee came striding down the stairs just in time for Abby and Gibbs to catch him up on the events of the day. Tim nodded in understanding and went over to his desk to grab his backpack. He was just reaching in the top drawer of his desk for his Dramamine when Gibbs' voice rang through the bullpen.

"DiNozzo! David! Go see the director and then grab your gear and get to Iowa City. You're both on errand detail today. Find Kirk and McCoy and bring Jenkins back to D.C. I want to know what else he was ready to talk about. McGee – background and research. I want everything we had on the Jenkins case," Gibbs ordered, opening up the customary drawer for his gun and badge. He grabbed the jacket off the shelf behind his desk and shrugged it on. "I'm going for coffee."

…And the bubble was officially popped. "Boss, you know I'm allergic to cold weather! It makes me break out in hives!" DiNozzo insisted at Gibbs' retracting back.

"Of course, you could stay here and help Ducky clean the coolers in autopsy. Palmer's on vacation. I heard he's taking volunteers to fill the spot," Gibbs said while he hit the down button on the elevator. Stepping in, he turned around and looked Tony straight in the eye. "Your call."

"Thanks, Boss. I'll go to Iowa," DiNozzo said with a cringe. Tony allowed the doors to close on Gibbs' scowling face before he allowed his head fall onto the smooth surface of his desk. He let out a little squeak of agony. "Why me?" he whined fitfully.

Ziva walked up and laid a mock-placating hand on her partner's back while DiNozzo dramatically scratched at his body and shuddered. She clucked her tongue a couple of times. "Oh, it will be okay, Tony," she said in a blatantly patronizing voice.

"You don't understand," he moaned dramatically as if he were being killed slowly and deliberately. His elbows and forearms muffled the words coming from his mouth, but the tone was perfectly clear.

"Understand what? What is so bad that it necessitates crying and whining? Are we headed to the Boondocks again?" Ziva asked, tilting her head to the side.

"No," DiNozzo said. He lifted his head and stared blankly ahead like a dead man about to walk the plank. His voice was flat and resigned when he added, "It's worse than the Boondocks. It's _Iowa_."

"Tony, according the latest weather maps, Iowa City, and the Midwest in general, is the big, red bullseye of a gigantic blizzard. Deadwood, South Dakota is reporting thirty inches of snow in less than twenty hours, and the same system that hit them is predicted to spin south in the next couple of hours to sit over," Tim said, clicking a few buttons dramatically to put the Midwest radar up on the plasma, "…Right where you're headed. Have fun."

Tony turned and glared at Tim. "McGeek, your poker face sucks. Stop looking so happy. Seriously, Tim. _Why_ are you so happy? We're flying into a giant wall of snow. No one should like this, not if they're sane."

"Present company included?" McGee asked cheekily.

DiNozzo grabbed his bag angrily from its stash place under his desk, stuffing a few things in it for the ride. He shot another glare at McGee just for good measure when Tim started whistling the Canadian national anthem. "Okay, Tim. We're going to Iowa. Not Canada. Iowa."

McGee shrugged. "Close enough. Just make sure when you come home, you don't say, 'Ya, sure, you betcha,' all the time."

"Probie, you're a walking encyclopedia. You have to know that's Minnesota, not Iowa."

"It's semantics, Tony. I hardly think a couple hundred miles is going to make a huge difference. They're both located in the heart of the Midwest, where it's cold and snowing, and probably not very pleasant," Tim replied, unable (and unwilling) to keep the smirk of satisfaction from his face.

"You're enjoying this way too much," DiNozzo hissed over the monitor of his computer. "It's like rubbing salt into an open wound."

"Would I do that to you?" McGee shrugged and plastered a superior smirk across his face. In a voice that was dripping with sarcasm, McGee said, "Tony, when I spent all that time in Canada earlier this year, I learned a thing or two from our northern counterparts. They taught me that you can't hate the weather, and you can't control it. They showed me that I had to embrace the winter if I was going to survive it. You'd be surprised what you can learn if you're just a little more open minded."

"I can't believe that I'm being lectured by a guy who had to re-train his accent so he wasn't mistaken for Bryan Adams every time he opened his mouth when he got back home," Tony muttered under his breath. "And what people in their right minds embrace winters like that? You told me that in the ten steps it took you to get from the door to car, you repeatedly froze your balls off. I wasn't worried then because it was you, but what about me? What about the boys?"

"Regretting spending all that time in MTAC making fun of me now, DiNozzo? I think someone's jealous of all the skills I picked up north of the border. In fact, I think I might have an extra set of long underwear for you to use." He shifted in his chair, a smug grin of satisfaction plastered all over his youthful face. "Tell you what: just bring me back some real maple syrup and some moose jerky and we'll call it good."

DiNozzo growled as he stuffed the final personal items in his backpack, turned and stalked toward the elevators. Screw super gluing McGee's hands to his keyboard – he should have glued Tim's desk (and everything on it) to the floor. At least a long, boring flight to Iowa would give him a long time to plan the next epic prank. Not even a phone call a minute on his Craigslist ad would be enough to make up for all of McGee's gloating. Tony slumped down at his desk and picked up the phone to make the reservations with the transport from Andrews. His fingers dialed while he glared at McGee.

Ziva watched the entire exchange with growing amusement. It was not often that Tim was able to turn the tables on his senior field agent, and she could see he was clearly enjoying every second of it. Truthfully, so was she, because Tony and his ego did need a good, hard reality check every now and again. She thought it was good for him. It built character, as her father might have once said. She shrugged, picked up her bag from the floor, and slung it loosely over her shoulder. "I am going to inform the Director. Does anyone need anything from the machines upstairs?"

"Nope. I'm good," McGee answered, rapidly punching keys while he searched the computerized files for all of NCIS' information on the Jenkins case.

Tony stared longingly at the gun in his desk drawer, wondering if it would be grounds for dismissal if he were to throw it at McGee. Maybe if he just tossed the magazine instead of the whole gun…

DiNozzo's fingers twitched once, twice and he was just about to reach for the black alloy Sig when Gibbs' voice stopped him.

Customary coffee in hand, Gibbs breezed back into the bullpen. He shrugged out of heavy overcoat and draped it over his chair. He settled at his desk and fished out his reader glasses from the drawer before he looked at both Tony and McGee. "No killing each other, you two. That's an order." The Gunny shot a glare at DiNozzo before he said with a wave of his hand, "You and Ziva go. Now."

"Just stay away from the wood chippers!" McGee called from the squad room. Tim felt his phone buzz in his pocket, and pulling it out, he studied the caller ID. It was not a number he recognized, so he thumbed over the lock and put the device to his ear. "McGee."

Tony took a deep breath and grabbed the seabag he kept stashed in the floor under his desk for similar occasions. He draped his coat over his arm before he rounded his desk, joining Ziva at the mouth of the bullpen after she procured her required travel essentials. They walked in stride toward the bank of elevators, pausing only because each car was on another floor. The brief respite while the pair waited for the elevator gave DiNozzo the opportunity to turn around and stare straight at the team's former probie. The look of smug satisfaction on his face while Tim stammered away was almost maniacal.

McGee's eyebrows furrowed, and for a brief second, Tim looked much more like the unsure, somewhat confused and green rookie than the seasoned investigator he'd become. McGee listed to the caller before he replied, "No, I didn't put any ad on Craigslist, offering my car for sale. I'm very happy with it, and I need it to get to work every day. And-what do I look like? Why are you asking me-No, I am _not interested in a date!"_

The elevator dinged, announcing its arrival on the bullpen floor, and Tony turned to step into the small cubicle with his partner. Waving, he caught McGee's angry glare as the doors closed. "Bye, McLucky!"

"Tony! I'm going to kill you!"

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><p><strong>Next Up<strong>: It's poker night in Iowa City for Kirk, Pike, McCoy and Scotty.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Notes**: Okay, for those of you unfamiliar with my cop!verse for Star Trek: 2009, here it is in a nutshell: Kirk and McCoy are partners, originally teamed up so McCoy could train Kirk. Though Jim's been off the training wheels for nearly a year now, their relationship is reminiscent of Franks and Gibbs, or of DiNozzo and McGee – Kirk will always be the rookie, no matter how long he's been a cop. Pike is their Lieutenant, and McCoy's original partner (and FTO). He and Len are fairly tight, especially after some of the events in their backstories, like Chris vs. the speeding car and McCoy's issues with alcohol. Lynn is Pike's wife, and together, they have a teenage son, Ethan. Spock is the head of IA, and while McCoy and Kirk are civil with him, the three are far from friends. Greg Serdeski is the city's desk sergeant, who thinks it's a sport to irritate McCoy. Finally, Scotty is Iowa City chief mechanic. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer**: I own nothing recognizable here, be it Star Trek, NCIS or Tombstone. I make no money from my writing, so please don't sue me.

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><p><strong>Chapter 2<strong>

_Iowa City, Iowa_

Teenagers.

Seriously.

Chris Pike dunked a tortilla chip headlong into the seven layer dip and stuck the savory snack in his mouth. Crunching loudly, he allowed the flavors to meld on his taste buds before he rested his chin on his fist. Feeling far from the police department lieutenant, Pike attempted to sit up straighter when three sets of eyes darted in his general direction. In a flat, frustrated tone, he asked, "Does anyone have any bright ideas how to deal with a stubborn teenager?"

"Boot camp," McCoy supplied succinctly while he peeked at the two playing cards lying face down on the table in front of him.

Pike shot his sergeant a disapproving look while he took a finishing swig of his beer. "I'm talking about _my_ teenager, Len. Not one you arrest and book."

"Aren't they one and the same?" McCoy quipped as grabbed a handful of honey roasted peanuts from the dish strategically placed to his right. He popped the lot into his mouth, chewed and added through a half-full mouth, "Nothing a night in jail can't fix."

"Is that how you deal with the kids these days? 'Arrest first, questions later?' Come on, Len. I know I taught you better than that," Pike replied, though his tone belied his mock-seriousness.

From across the table, Jim Kirk chimed in his two cents. "It's a known fact on the street that Bones doesn't 'deal' with them. He just scares them into compliance. One eyebrow raise from this guy," Kirk said, clapping his partner on the shoulder, "And the kids are running for cover. Hell, my partner's more intimidating than the K-9s!"

"Did that really come from your mouth, Jim? Because I _know_ even you're not dumb enough to compare me to a drooling, slobbering animal," McCoy fired back, twisting his body to the right so he was facing his partner. He pursed his lips when Kirk's only reply was that of a shit-eating grin as he said, "Coming from someone who pants like a dog every time a pretty woman crosses his path, that's rich."

"That, McCoy, is what we call 'deflection'," Pike started, unable to keep the smirk completely from gracing his distinguished features while he slapped one broad palm down flat against the tabletop, "And we all know it's a load of bullshit. Those dogs are better trained than you. They don't talk back and they obey the orders they're given without a million questions to the contrary or strings of endless bitching,"

"And they also bite on command, which is something I apparently need to teach them so they can deal with you all," McCoy replied in a throaty, angry growl. "Besides, I thought we were talking about your son."

"We are. Or rather, we were." Chris shifted in his customary chair, the one situated against the railing that divided the kitchen from the living room. The weekly gathering for no purpose other than relaxation was the name, and poker was the always the game. Always held at Pike's home, it was a tradition that originated around McCoy's rookie days, back when Chris was still figuring out how to deal with an anti-social introvert of a partner. Some of the faces changed over the years due to retirements, family commitments, and unfortunately, deaths, but the two former partners remained constants, as did the good times and the good stories.

The table was a little lean for the night; missing from the party were Greg Serdeski and Spock. Both men begged off with other work-related conflicts, though Chris had his doubts about the city's desk sergeant. Scuttlebutt had it on good authority that one of the department's two perennial bachelors (the other being McCoy) finally lassoed himself a woman who could not only put up with his bullshit, but who wasn't shy about giving it right back, and Chris was not about to stand in the way of the man's happiness for the sake of poker night. The man deserved it. Still, it meant tons of ribbing when Greg showed up the next day at work, undoubtedly in a turtleneck to cover up all the hickeys. Pike had $50 riding on it, and he sure as hell wasn't planning to lose.

The other absent pillar, Spock, was in ensconced in the midst of giant IA investigation into a rash of missing or improperly disposed of drug evidence from the city's evidence locker. Chief Barnett assigned his best sleuth to the job and made it clear that the case had top priority. Ever since an internal audit caught some missing money and property, Barnett had his eyes on one particular group. Now, the only step left was for Spock to nail their sorry asses to the wall. The IA cop reported that they were nearing a breakthrough in the case, and that, "It was imperative that he focus on the task at hand, for one dirty cop was one too many." Chris just nodded and agreed, hoping that he'd see Spock next week.

McCoy cleared his throat. He'd known Pike long enough to know the expression that would park itself all over the lieutenant's face when he was daydreaming, and there really wasn't a clearer example of the faraway, unfocused and glassy look in Pike's eyes than what the group was seeing in the present. He snapped his fingers. "Chris? You with us?"

To McCoy's right, Scotty whistled and waved his hand in front of Pike's face. "Oy! You there, Pike? It's your play."

He'd almost forgotten the entire point of his guests for the evening. The feel of the cards didn't even register in his hands, even though he'd clearly been picking away at the corner in an unconscious nervous tick. Chris shook his head, focused and lifted the edges to look at what was dealt to him. Impassively, he reached for a couple of chips. Tossing them into the pile, Pike scrubbed one hand over his face and sighed. "Yeah. Sorry, boys. I'm obviously a little distracted tonight."

"What's going on with Ethan? He going through his teenage rebellion finally?" McCoy asked while he folded his cards with a disgusted grunt.

"What the hell do you mean by 'finally'? He's barely fifteen," Pike replied, raising one eyebrow at his former partner.

"And by that age, Jim here had lost count of the number of times he hacked his school's database to change the count on his tardy and absent without a valid excuse," McCoy said in response while he motioned over his shoulder toward the refrigerator where Kirk was standing.

"Hey!" Jim exclaimed, overdramatically offended. "I was going to offer you all refills, but if you're just going to slander my skills, then I'll get my own and be done with it."

"You'll get me a beer if you want to come back and sit at this table without being shot, Kirk," Pike said evenly and without missing a beat while he shuffled the cards up. Thanks to Scotty's fold that gave Chris the hand, the Lieutenant had need to resituate his newly acquired chips as he waited for Jim to sit back down.

Jim laughed out loud at his boss' boss and reached back into the appliance. He grabbed three beers and a ginger ale for McCoy before he sauntered back to the table. Setting his loot down, Kirk plopped down in his 'assigned' chair to Scotty's right. He patted the bottles and cans, dipped his voice a bit and employed a rather strange mix of refined southern accent before he said, "Refills. There. Now we can be friends again."

McCoy rolled his eyes at his partner and proclaimed, "Good God, Jim. You know there's a reason you're not allowed to imitate that movie. You're butchering it."

"And you're so much better?" Kirk asked, returning his voice to his normal speaking tone and natural accent.

"At least I'm from the South. I have a better chance of _not_ sounding like a complete jackass."

Jim wrinkled his nose. "Bones, you hate your accent."

"I don't hate my accent. I just hate that you have to make fun of it," he replied, turning a slight shade of pink.

"Ah, it's not that bad," Scotty proclaimed, allowing his brogue to thicken considerably. "At least they don't have to ask you to repeat yourself five times over because they can't understand ye at all."

Pike snorted. "You didn't hear him when he first got here, Scotty. I could have used a translator for the first few months in a car with him."

McCoy held up his hands. "What the hell did I do to deserve this kind of bullshit? Every damned time, it turns into open season on McCoy night. Focus on someone else for once!"

"Focus is a four letter word at this table," Chris supplied. "You should know that by now."

"Actually, isn't it five?" Scotty asked, mentally counting the letters of the word in his head.

"That was figurative, Scotty," Kirk said gently, giving the Scotsman a tap on the shoulder.

The mechanic smiled. "I know, lad. I was just trying to get a smile out of our dear lieutenant here, who looks like someone just killed his dog. What's going on with that boy of yours, Chris? I've known the lot of you for a while now, and I think this is the first signs I've seen of trouble from your camp. I thought Ethan was a pretty good kid."

Pike flexed the deck of cards in his hands before he cut it while he contemplated how to word his troubles. "He is, normally. It's just that lately…I don't know," he said, trailing off. Chris shifted while his friends waited patiently for him to continue. "I don't know what's up with him. He took a run at another kid at hockey last week and got suspended for two games because it was a dirty play. Dirty and unprovoked."

Kirk narrowed his eyes. "Wow. That's odd. Ethan loves hockey, and he's one of the cleanest players I've ever seen. Perfect hits, perfect timing and done by the letter of the law."

"Unlike you, Jim," McCoy couldn't help but throw in.

Pike let out a halfhearted snort of agreement, though it wasn't nearly as engaged as it would have been if he'd really been into the conversation. The normally cool but upbeat lieutenant was sitting slightly slouched in his chair, looking strangely troubled. "I got a call from his guidance counselor the other day, telling me that Ethan was in a fight with three other boys. He's suspended, which is why he's sulking in his room and not out here with us tonight."

"Embarrassed the lad, didn't you Chris?" Scotty asked, taking a healthy swig of his beer.

"I think he did that all on his own," Pike answered honestly.

"Why the fight?" McCoy asked. "That's not like him, either. Ethan's like his mom on that one – he'd rather show them that he can outtalk them instead of beat them up."

Pike ran a hand over his forehead. "I know. That's what's so frustrating, because he won't tell us. Not at all. He wouldn't even tell the principal, even under the threat and follow through of a longer out of school suspension. It's got me."

"Is this at all related to that scraper incident a few months back?" McCoy asked, gently broaching the contentious topic with his superior and friend.

Pike cringed at just the mention of the police chase heard 'round the county. For a pursuit that lasted a couple of miles at speeds that barely registered on the patrol cars' speedometers, it was probably the biggest thing to happen in Iowa City in the past ten years. Chris picked up his beer and grimaced when he realized it was empty. While he reached for the full but unopened bottle, he admitted, "I don't know. I'm not sure. Ethan's been hanging around the Russian kid lately – Chenko? Cherpov? Something."

"It's 'Chekov,' Lieu. That's the kid we arrested that night with Ethan, isn't it?" Kirk asked, shooting a look toward his partner. When Pike nodded to the affirmative, Jim continued with, "Do you think he's the problem?"

Pike waved a dismissive hand. "Not at all. That kid might be a devious little bastard, but he's harmless. His idea of fun is not going to hurt someone else, and it sure as hell won't make Ethan violent and aggressive."

"And that means you have no clue what's wrong," Scotty concluded out loud.

"Exactly," Chris admitted. "I just wish I could understand what's going on with him. It's not like him to be so confrontational," Pike replied with an angry growl.

From his position to the left of his lieutenant, Kirk watched. The frustration on Chris' face was so uncharacteristic of the confident mask Pike wore on a daily basis. The lieutenant sat, chewing away at his lip while his brain tried to figure out what was going on in his own home. Jim knew it had to be an odd sensation, and one that probably made the man a bit queasy. To relinquish control was the worst feeling in the world to a person who was used to exuding and having it in every aspect of his day to day life. In a rare moment of maturity, Jim said, "Lieu, it's probably not what you think."

Pike's head snapped to his left and his eyes narrowed in suspicion. The trained observer partition of his brain started putting bits and pieces together when he said, "You've been awfully quiet in the past five minutes, Jim. That's not like you, so by process of elimination, that means you know something. Spill. Now. That's an order."

Kirk shrugged. "Hey, you gave me that high school assignment for a reason, remember? You thought I could, 'Connect with the kids on a better level than my older-than-dirt partner,' ever could."

McCoy slammed the can of ginger ale down on the table so hard that some of the liquid splashed up over the lip of the opening. With one hand free, McCoy wound up and directed a solid punch to his partner's arm, quite probably harder than necessary.

"Hey!" Jim exclaimed, rubbing the sore spot of contact. "Dude, that one hurt."

"It was supposed to," McCoy growled. "It's a reminder to respect your elders, not that you'd ever do that."

"Don't hate me for saying it like it is, Bones." The smirk on his face he used to address his partner vanished when Kirk turned to address Pike. "Look, I talked to Ethan today when I was at the school. I saw him sitting in front of Jessop's office, and I wanted to know what was wrong."

"Did he tell you?"

Jim lifted his hand and, with his palm flat to the table, tilted his wrist left and right. "Eh, sort of. I filled in a lot of the blanks myself, but I think I know what's going on."

"Jim, shouldn't this have been the first thing out of your mouth?" McCoy raised both hands in a gesture of disapproving incredulity.

"Bones, I gave the kid my word that I wouldn't squawk the reason to the rest of the world. He thinks it's stupid, and he's embarrassed by it because he thinks he should be able to handle it on his own. He just needed someone to talk to that wasn't his old man," Kirk said with an apologetic look in Pike's direction. "No offense."

"None taken. I'm just glad someone got him to pull his head out of his ass, even if it's not me. But as his father, do I at least get a hint?" Pike asked, popping off the top off the new beer Kirk retrieved with the Labatt Blue hockey stick bottle opener he kept on his keychain.

"Ethan's just pissed about us doing our jobs. We're cramping his style," Kirk answered with a noncommittal shrug of his shoulders. With his face schooled to impassivity, Jim hoped he at least appeared aloof, even if he wasn't entirely feeling it. Chris Pike was a genuinely nice guy, but to the very core he was still the boss, and he knew how to act like it. Jim knew that if his lieutenant wanted answers, he'd have them one way or another.

Pike's eyes bored into the junior officer like the laser sight affixed to the bottom of his gun. The majority of the department was convinced that the man was a human lie detector, and it was a somewhat enjoyable skill Pike used to his every advantage to make his subordinates squirm. His chin dipped as he studied Kirk's placid expression, looking for the physical signs of evasion. "Is that all?" Chris asked.

Jim sighed; he didn't want to throw Ethan completely under the bus, so he settled with a cryptic, "It's just high school stuff that has nothing to do with you or Lynn. It's not that big of a deal. I promised him I'd help him take care of it, and I will."

Pike nodded in acquiescence and straightened the cards in his hands, backing down from the role of hard-ass cop. In a much friendlier tone, he said, "See that you do, Kirk. My son's in need of a little guidance, clearly."

"From him? Are you nuts?" McCoy said with a point of his index finger toward Jim.

"Normally, I try to stay neutral during the lover's quarrels that take place between my two mates here, but I have to agree with Len, Pike," Scotty chimed in from his side of the table.

"Hey! Just because I got kicked out of Boy Scouts does not mean that I'm unfit to be a role model!" Kirk exclaimed, leaning back in his chair while looking as smug as possible. "Besides, my partner is a saint. It's impossible to live up to that, so I just go for the opposite. It's more fun that way."

"Next to you, anyone's a saint," McCoy snorted back at his partner.

"Oh, for Christ's sake. I can't believe I'm about to do this, but would you two give Kirk a break already? You were young once, too you know," Pike gently reminded Scotty and McCoy with a raised eyebrow and poignant stare. "And Jim, your partner is no saint. I can personally disprove that one. In his younger days, he gave the old chief more than a few headaches."

McCoy wisely snapped his jaw closed when he felt his face redden with embarrassment. "Chris…" he said, tone low and cautionary. "Don't encourage the peanut gallery."

Jim waved a dismissive hand. "It's okay, Lieu. I know the truth. Bones wasn't born, therefore he was never young. This can't apply to him. What was that line again?" Jim said, wracking his brain for the appropriate movie analogy, altering it to fit McCoy's personality and history. "I think it was, 'He was assembled at medical school out of the spare body parts of dead interns,' or something like that."

While McCoy sputtered unintelligently, Chris snorted out loud. He reached out a hand and knuckle bumped Jim. "Touché, Kirk. I'll have to remember that one." With a smirk, Pike let his eyes roam over the faces of his friends and asked lightly, "Now, is everyone finally ready?"

"Born that way, Lieu," Kirk replied, dipping his hand into the bowl of pretzels next to the chips.

McCoy let out a long combination snort and scoff. "Like you were born to help me on that home invasion earlier this week?"

Jim's face paled. "Oh, no. We are _not_ going there!" Kirk insisted. He adopted a petulant expression to his already boyish face before he clamped his jaw closed. Jim clenched his fists under the table while his body tensed. A fine shudder ran through his frame before he shook his head. Kirk took a big gulp of beer, swallowed and insisted, "Ugh. Gross."

"Don't be such a pansy-ass, Nancy Boy," McCoy corrected, pulling out his cell phone from his pocket. He unlocked the screen and scrolled to the pictures stored on the device before he pulled up one of the most recent shots. In the foreground, a black shirtsleeve gave way to set of golden sergeant stripes. Coiled around the forearm was a coral and white colored corn snake, happily looking toward the other living subject of the photograph. About a foot away from the snake, Jim Kirk's face was twisted into a sadly comical expression of hideous disgust. Both of Kirk's eyes were pinched shut, his hands were out defensively, and he was recoiling backwards as if he were trying to ward off some evil spirit instead of a harmless reptile. The photo was, in a word, _priceless_.

McCoy tossed his phone on the table for the small group to see, sitting back in his chair with a triumphant smirk.

Pike leaned in to look at the small device spinning in the middle of the table. Amid a few poker chips, Pike reached out one hand and plucked out the phone. He tapped the screen to brighten the photo, studiously examining it as if he were handling a piece of evidence. The beginnings of smile formed at the corner of his mouth, and his lips warbled with exertion as he attempted to keep a straight face. With a couple of poorly disguised laughing coughs, he lifted his eyes toward Kirk and wordlessly passed McCoy's phone to Scotty.

Scotty grabbed the sergeant's battered, abused smartphone from the lieutenant's hand. He stared at the picture. And blinked. And stared some more. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity for Kirk, the PD's mechanic threw his head back and howled out a long, loud laugh. He motioned toward McCoy, holding up the phone and the incriminating picture. "This is bloody priceless! Are you kidding me? After all this time putting up with your partner's nonsense, all it takes is a snake to shut him up?"

"Apparently."

"Where the hell did you find a snake?" Pike asked after he finally allowed his smile to show full-force.

"We responded to a 9-1-1 call of a possible break-in on Sheridan and Grant. The homeowner said she was hearing strange thumping in the basement, which turned out to be the snake trying to get out of the dryer," McCoy said, picking his phone back up and pocketing the device.

"How did you know it wasn't going to bite you?" Scotty asked. "Those things can be poisonous, you know."

"I'm from Georgia, Scotty," McCoy replied with a sigh, allowing his accent to drip off his lips. "We have more snakes down there than you can shake a stick at. I learned early on what I can't touch. This sure ain't the first time I've seen a snake one up in an odd place that I've had to move."

"Well, I suppose that's good," Scotty supplied. "I think."

"And good you were there," Pike added. "Gaila in accounting has been all over my ass lately because of all the shit your partner breaks, McCoy. How the hell you guys can go through three sets of light bars in six months is beyond my comprehension. If I had to tell her that we needed to replace a dryer while we pulled a half dozen bullets out of someone's wall because Kirk shot a snake, she might done the honors and killed Jim herself."

"I wouldn't have shot it!" Kirk insisted glumly from his side of the table. "I would have only TASERed it."

"That would mean you'd have to get close to it, jackass, right before you went hands-on. I would put a month's salary that you'd puss out before you even touched the thing," McCoy fired back, daring his partner into contradiction with a practiced steely glare.

Jim chewed on his lip while he watched the amusement work across his friends' faces. Thoughts of torture and misdeeds in a past life flashed through his head as he wondered what he did to deserve such treatment. "Bones, you hate flying. Lieu, you hate heights. Scotty – you hate being hungry. Why is all the hate being targeted right here?" Jim asked, motioning toward his own chest with the index fingers of both hands.

"Because we're more amused when we're picking on you, Jim. You should know by now it's a right of passage," Pike replied, smacking Kirk on the arm. "You don't open the door often, so we have to exploit it when we can."

Kirk's head bobbed up and down, accepting the light teasing as penance for being the most inexperienced man at the table. Jim would forever be the new guy, no matter how long he was on the force. With a sideways glance toward his comrades, Kirk asked, "Yeah, can we just keep this between the four of us? I've got a reputation to uphold."

McCoy scoffed loudly before he proclaimed, "Like hell I'm going to forget. That picture of you is going on my wall as the day I rendered Jim Kirk speechless."

"Screw you all," Kirk muttered under his breath.

Scotty and Pike snickered loudly while Chris resituated the deck of cards in his hand and began dealing. Focusing on his task kept him from bursting out in hysterical laughter. He tossed one card toward each man for a total of two before he tabled one and flipped three cards face up on the center of the table. "All right. No limit hold 'em. Let's go."

Several hours and many laughs later, the group bid one another a good night. For two of the men at the table, it was a good thing the group never played for money. Predictably, Scotty lost his figurative shirt and Kirk went out a foolish bet against the squad's lieutenant in a effort to bluff him out of his stack. Pike not only called it, but flipped the tables on Jim, effectively ending his night with one hand.

In the end, it wound up being Pike and Bones going heads up against one another. McCoy was the big stack, but Chris came out victorious on a big gamble. He hit a lucky river card, completing an aces-over-kings full house when he went all in. McCoy slapped down his two pairs triumphantly only to see his win evaporate into a cloud of smoke when his former partner calmly turned over his two cards. Much swearing and cheering abounded, and McCoy vowed revenge.

"Same time, same place next week?" Scotty asked.

"Yeah," Chris said, gathering up the chips and the cards. He sorted them by color and stuck them back in their respective cases, ready for use when the group met again.

"Awesome," Jim replied, shrugging on his jacket and shoes. "As the loser, I'll bring the pizza."

"It better be edible pizza, Jim. If you bring any of that flatbread shit, you and I are going to have words," Pike replied, clapping Kirk on the shoulder and pointing a finger in the young cop's face. When Jim nodded to the affirmative, Chris waved and said, "I'll see you all tomorrow."

"You got it. Thanks Lieu," Jim answered as he walked out the door.

Outside, Kirk found McCoy already waiting. Bones was leaned causally up against his truck while he watched the gentle snow fall against the pitch black of the night. His head turned when he saw Kirk's shadow coming from the garage and an easy, carefree smile broke out across his face. With his eyes twinkling, he said in the same refined but still southern accent Kirk tried to employ earlier in the night, "Maybe poker just ain't your game, Jim."

Kirk shrugged his shoulders, looked down at his feet and let out a light laugh. "All right. I admit it. You'll always do that way better than me. I've got a ways to go before I can best the master."

Bones snorted. "I'll roll over dead before that happens." McCoy looked down at the keys in Kirk's hands and then back up at his partner. "Are you going to be okay to drive?"

"Yeah, I only had a three, and they were pretty well spread out. I'm cool," Kirk replied, spinning the key ring around one finger. He had to keep from rolling his eyes good naturedly; despite the craggy exterior and the general crabbiness, it was clear that McCoy really did care. After all they'd been through, Kirk wasn't entirely surprised, but he was still touched by the concern. He walked out of the covered space with a smirk on his face, feeling the cold, frozen precipitation hit him on the cheeks. "Huh. It's snowing already."

"Yep," McCoy said as Jim stopped next to him. The two partners stood silently, observing their surroundings as their breath condensed in front of their faces. McCoy's face contorted into an angry snarl before he added, "They're saying eighteen inches in twenty four hours."

In a bit of payback for the earlier ribbing, Kirk laughed and said, "Cowboy up, Southern Man! It'll be fun. We get to go play in the snow tomorrow!"

"Fun? You must have rocks in your head, Jim," McCoy muttered. "My idea of 'fun' is not what is going to make up our day tomorrow. Every time it snows, we respond to a billion accidents because people _have_ to go out and buy that new electronic gizmo to keep them sane while it storms. Or, God forbid their kids miss hockey practice. You know, where I come from, when it snows, that's a good indication to the population to stay indoors. But you all? No, you think it's a fine idea to just go right on with your lives. What's wrong with you people? Are you insane?"

Kirk snorted. There was nothing like a good, properly-pissed-off McCoy monologue, and it was something Jim would never, ever find boring. He shot a glance toward his partner and asked, "Are you done?"

"Yes," McCoy muttered, turning toward Kirk while he crossed his arms over his broad chest. "Not that it does any good."

"It entertains me, so that's good," Jim laughed out. He gave his partner a shove and added, "Besides, all this snow discrimination is coming from the same guy who was making fun of me for hating snakes. At least a snake is a living creature. Bones, you're afraid of frozen water!" Jim wiped a hand across McCoy's windshield, picked up a big handful of accumulation, and tossed it at the sergeant.

"Goddammit, Jim. Stop acting like an infant," McCoy insisted through one of his trademark scowls while he brushed off his coat.

"You're whining like one! I figured I'd join the party," Kirk shot back, holding his hands out at his sides in mock-defensiveness.

"Once. Just once, I'd like to get through one shift with you that's normal."

"Define 'normal', Bones."

McCoy snorted. "Not you, that's for damned sure." He waved his hands toward Jim's car and looked up at the falling snow. "Now go on. Get out of here, get some rest and be ready for shift tomorrow. God only knows with my luck, we'll be invaded by the FBI because karma hates me."

Jim stuck his key in the door lock and opened it. Sliding in, he tossed out, "Be careful what you wish for, Bones! You never know what you might get!"

"My daddy used to tell me that I could wish in one hand and shit in the other while I waited to see what filled up first. Guess how well that went?" McCoy asked Kirk, deadpanned.

Jim wrinkled his nose and tilted his head to the side. "Dude, that's disgusting. Have I ever told you that you Southerners are weird?"

"Every other day."

"It's the truth, man," Kirk said as he put one foot in the foot well of his car. Leaning on the open door's frame, he scrunched up his face and admitted. "You didn't really do that, did you? Wait. Nevermind, because I don't want to know. I'll see you at roll."

McCoy waved a good night to Kirk as Jim backed his car out of Pike's driveway. Shaking his head, he climbed into his old winter truck and turned the key. Letting the engine warm for a couple of minutes, Len used the time to pick an appropriate radio station before he set off for home. Backing out of Chris' driveway, he cursed when his tires caught a bit of black ice at the bottom of the hill leading out of Pike's neighborhood. He steadied the truck, easing off the gas and steering into the skid while he waited for the tires to find purchase on the barren asphalt. 'Goddamn insanity," he muttered under his breath, looking up through the windshield at the snow coming down.

He really, really did hate winter.

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><p><strong>Next Up<strong>: Ziva and DiNozzo discover the joys of driving in a Midwestern blizzard.


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Notes**: First of all, I want to apologize for the lack of updates. My father-in-law had a heart attack last week and was airlifted from his home town to Minneapolis proper for intensive care (about a two hour drive away), so we've been concentrating on making sure he's all squared away and dealing with the ramifications. Obviously, I've not had a lot of time to devote to fic because of it.

That said, here's the next chapter. Yes, I know the military doesn't fly into Cedar Rapids, but I thought if I did it factually and put Ziva in a car for 116 miles with Tony in the middle of a blizzard from Des Moines, I wouldn't have a story because she would have killed him. Extra points if you catch either the Top Gear and Transformers references I have in this chapter. As always, comments are lovely (and cherished), but not required.

**Disclaimer**: I own nobody. Nada. Zip. Zilch. Star Trek and NCIS belong to Gene Roddenberry and Don Bellasario. I make no money. Please don't sue me.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 3<strong>

_Outside Cedar Rapids, Iowa_

Somewhere up in heaven, there had to be a deity laughing his ass off. The problem was that Tony DiNozzo didn't exactly think the joke was very damned funny.

It was bad enough he had to go to Iowa. Even worse was being sent to Iowa in the middle of the winter, during a blizzard. Worse still was being sent to Iowa, in the middle of a ridiculous blizzard, with Ziva in the driver's seat. DiNozzo made a mental note to accept a week's worth of PT with Gibbs in exchange for a fetch-run like this the next time he was given the opportunity to choose.

The drive to Iowa City from Cedar Rapids was just as hair-raising as the flight into the blasted state had been. According to the pilot, the transport C-130 on which the two NCIS agents hitched a ride was the last plane into the airport before it closed for the duration of the storm. DiNozzo was sure it was an entirely instrument guided approach – for how hard the snow was falling, the pilots might just as well been wearing blindfolds. The snow was thick, heavy and wet, coming down as if it were a white curtain trying to blanket every single surface.

It took the pair fifteen minutes to find the assigned government car, and another fifteen minutes to brush off the snow before Ziva and Tony were ready to go. The weather continued to deteriorate, and with it, so did DiNozzo's mood. She had the windshield wipers on high and defroster going full blast, but it was like sticking a Band-Aid on a broken leg for as much good as it was doing. Tony still couldn't see more than a few feet in front of the car and his resulting grip on the 'oh-shit' bar above the window had the skin on his knuckles stretched and white. Most sane people would have pulled over and stopped, or better yet, they would have stayed in Cedar Rapids where it was relatively safe, but no. Not Ziva. She insisted that they complete their mission, and the part of DiNozzo's ego that was just _slightly_ male did not allow him to be shown up by his female partner.

Even if his female partner was a bad-ass killing machine, trained by Mossad.

But now, he was wondering if he should have listened to that little voice in the back of his head, the one that kept him alive for all his young years. It told him repeatedly that he should have stayed somewhere safe, which was anywhere that wasn't being lambasted by a giant blizzard. "Ziva, I told you this was a really bad idea. We should have waited. I can't even see where we're going."

"Stop being such a baby. We have been driving for ages, and at a very – how shall I put it – sedate pace?" Ziva said without turning her face toward DiNozzo. Her side of head was resting up against the cool pane of the window and her tone was flat and bored. Her breath was coming out in even, steady puffs, frosting up the corner of the glass while she stared straight ahead into nothingness.

"It only feels like ages because we haven't seen anything but snow for the last hour! Tony hissed from the passenger seat of the car.

Ziva pulled her head up and turned so her face was toward her partner. "No, it is because you will not allow me to go any faster than twenty-five miles per hour! At this rate, I could get out and _walk_ faster than I am driving!"

"If you did that, great! Then I would be able to drive, and I would know that I'm not going to die on some barren patch of Iowan road," Tony exclaimed, sarcastic and punchy.

Ziva whipped out her cell phone. Punching up the GPS options on the device, she calculated the distance they'd already traveled and how far they needed to go. "Tony, we are not that far from Iowa City, maybe another six miles. We are not turning around to go back when it would be easier to go forward!" To accentuate her point, David pressed harder on the accelerator. The car complied and lurched forward, sending the pair at a breakneck pace into the throws of the blizzard, and more importantly, into the unknown.

It wasn't that he was afraid, because DiNozzos purportedly lacked the part of the brain that controlled the fear response. (Gibbs would probably tell him he lacked other parts of his brain too, but that was a topic for a different day.) But, Tony felt a sliver of panic churn in his gut when his partner hit the gas. He might have even slumped a few inches deeper into his seat when Ziva let go of the wheel to check her phone. His hands twitched, barely resisting the urge to grab the only part of the car that was keeping them on the road to steady it. Tony shook his head. For someone who grew up in the middle of a desert, the Israeli didn't seem at all bothered by driving in such horrid, foreign conditions. DiNozzo wasn't sure if that was a blessing or a curse.

About a half second later, Tony answered his own question. DiNozzo's eyes widened when, out of the haze of white snow, a large set of headlights loomed from the distance. At the same time, he felt the car drift left as his partner looked down in order to slip her phone back in her pocket. The low, loud tones of the Peterbilt's air horn sent DiNozzo's heart up into the back of his throat, right after a squeak of panic made its way out. He pointed, completely stricken. "Ziva! Look out!"

"Whoa!" she said as her head jerked up from the distracted focus. The pair heard the jake-brakes of the semi rattling when the driver downshifted frantically, and they felt the concussive force of the horn in their chests as the truck drew closer. Ziva cranked the wheel hard to the right, correcting perfectly for the amount of time and space between her and the semi. Unfortunately, she didn't compensate for the slippery and wet conditions of the snow, nor did she calculate for the icy pack underneath the salted bits of bare pavement. The back end skidded out and to the left as the car oversteered in freakish defiance against the normal response expected from a front wheel drive vehicle like the Crown Victoria. Ziva held it while the NCIS pair drifted sideways and directly into the path of the truck. At the very last second, she corrected the other way and fishtailed the car toward the right, snapping the car to relative safety.

A whitewash of snow and wind plowed over the windshield as the semi passed the government-issued car, and their respective bumpers come within inches of one another. Little bits of ice hit the glass with sound of _tink-tink-tink_ echoing loudly in Tony and Ziva's ears. The plethora of chrome, the wall of blue LEDs and the metallic paint of the Perterbilt's custom blue, red and orange flames caught the attention of both NCIS agents almost as much as the truck itself did. Well, that and the fact that a truck that size and weight would have crushed them like little tiny bugs.

Matching sets of yells bounced off the interior of the cabin while Ziva fought for control of the heavy vehicle. She managed to conquer one obstacle – evading a semi, but she still wasn't in control of the car. It was taking all her strength and skill to keep the car from spinning completely in a circle, but it was only a matter of time before physics eventually won out. She simply did not have enough experience on how to properly recover from a spin on a slick, icy surface to pull off the needed driving miracle. Ziva felt the car pass the point of no return, and she let the wheel slide through her hands when she knew they were going in the ditch. They spun in a circle, with the view out of the windshield alternating from barren road to solid embankment and back again. As the heavy snow pack loomed closer, only one thought ran through Ziva's mind. '_Tony is never going to let me live this one down_.'

A second later, the car slid down the ditch and collided with the wet snow bank.

It was almost like in the movies. A high pitched whine echoed in DiNozzo's ears while he felt his heart hammering away and about to burst right out of his chest. Time seemed to speed back up from the slow motion of the accident to a normal pace. He exhaled a shaky breath and looked over at his partner while he patted himself down. Nothing was bleeding, no bones seemed broken, and Little DiNozzo was intact. Good deal. Clearing his throat, he asked, "You okay, David?"

"I am fine," she said, her voice annoyingly steady and face steely and impassive. She looked around, and with an audible groan added, "It appears however, that our car is not."

DiNozzo craned his neck around the open space of the car's interior. From every vantage point, all he could see was white snow. Spatial awareness was coming back slowly and Tony realized that his body was angled downward at a fairly steep hilt. "Are we sideways?" he asked, giving his door a futile shove.

"Don't be ridiculous, Tony. We are just in the ditch, but your side of the car is down the embankment. We will need to call a wrecker to pull us out," she said matter-of-factly. Ziva reached into her pocket for her cell phone, the one that started the whole mess, and groaned. "Please tell me you have your phone."

"It's dead. I forgot to charge it before we left the office. Why? What's wrong with yours," he asked.

Wordlessly, Ziva held up her trashed phone. The screen was cracked and spider webbed out and the keyboard was mashed beyond recognition. "It must have hit the point between my hip and the seat belt." She tried to power it on, but received no response. The phone staunchly refused the initiate startup. Ziva tossed it in the back seat and crossed her arms over her chest. "Did you at least bring your car charger?"

Tony scoffed. "Don't act like this is my fault, David! You're the one who put the car in the ditch and broke your own phone while you were at it. I have nothing to do with everything that's gone wrong today."

"For once in your life." Sighing, she looked at Tony and then out the window at the angry, swirling white storm outside the car. "So what now?"

"Well, when we don't report in, I guess Gibbs will know something's wrong. So until then, I guess we wait. Want to play a game?" he asked, smirking broadly.

"No," was her flat reply. Ziva settled herself in for a long wait trapped in a car with a bored Tony DiNozzo. She would _not_ count the minutes until they were rescued. No, Ziva David had more self control that that.

She had enough self control not to kill him.

* * *

><p><em><span>Iowa City, Iowa<span>_

"What did I tell you about snow storms, Kirk?" McCoy groused as he practically dropped back into the driver's seat of the Charger. Snow dripped off his hair, his jacket collar and his shoulders. It puddled on the exposed bit of shirt just above his duty rig and he swore when the cold water touched his skin. "I think the stupidity crawls out of the woodwork just to piss me off. 'We were just on our way to Target to pick up Call of Duty, Sergeant! I didn't think it was that bad,' my ass!" McCoy complained, imitating the father and son pair responsible for their latest traffic nightmare when the former dropped a lit cigarette in his lap. The resulting small fender-bender turned into a six car pileup in the slippery and wet conditions, and it was doing nothing improve McCoy's already dour mood.

On the opposite side of the car, Jim smiled while he buckled his seat belt. Into his mic, he said, "Six-two. We're clear," before he turned toward his partner. "Come on, Bones. This is fun. Live a little, will you?"

"That's what I'm trying to do. Live." The sergeant motioned for the driver of the tow truck to head out in front of the cops. He gave the man a friendly salute before he looked left and eased his way back into the non-existent traffic, killing the light bars as soon as he was clear.

Rolling his eyes, Kirk snorted and proclaimed, "God, you're so dramatic!" as his phone buzzed in his pocket. Furrowing his brows, he pulled it out and clicked the screen on. "Hmm. Hey, I just got a text from Pike. He wanted to know if we've seen a set of feds who were on their way in from Cedar Rapids."

"In this?" McCoy asked, motioning out to the shit storm of snow swirling over Iowa City.

"Yeah. Pike said they were supposed to check in with their people when they got here this afternoon, but they haven't been heard from yet. Think we should be the rescue party? I mean, it's not like we have anything better to do," Kirk supplied suggestively. "Unless, of course, you want to keep responding to fender benders the rest of the day."

One day, McCoy swore up and down that he was going to develop a way to tell Jim Kirk that little magical word 'no.' But until that time, he would inevitably find himself sucked into whatever whim the kid found to entertain himself, all in the name of being a good partner and friend. This was definitely one of those times. Bones sighed, rolled his eyes and flipped the car around in the middle of the road. "All right, Kid. The faster we do this, the faster I go home."

"I knew you'd see it that way."

Bones shifted in his seat. Out loud, he thought, "All right. If they were coming from Cedar Rapids, they would probably come in on I-380. And if they were smart, which I doubt, they would have pulled over to stop because God only knows I can't see shit."

Peering through the windshield of the cruiser, Jim said, "It's not that bad! Stop acting like a – what did you call me last night? 'Nancy Boy'?"

"I sent you shrieking like a little girl when you saw a completely harmless little snake. This? This is actually dangerous, only because I'm stupid enough to not have called in sick today," McCoy muttered through his clenched jaw. "Let's find these morons and get the hell out of this shit."

"Why did you move here if you hate winter so much?" Kirk asked incredulously. "You bitch like this every year, but every year you know it's coming."

"Kid, I ask myself that same question every day of my life."

McCoy eased the car on to the entrance ramp for the interstate. The three hundred and forty horses under the hood and the Charger's rear wheel drive were a definite balancing act in such obscene conditions, and even with all the hours of performance driving, it was still a chore for McCoy to control the car. He feathered the throttle while he kept one hand on the emergency brake just in case the car started skidding in the wrong direction. The going was slow and arduous, and after five miles, they still hadn't found a single soul that was foolish enough to come into Iowa City during a massive blizzard.

Jim squinted out the window into the white-out conditions. "How far have we gone?"

McCoy looked down at the odometer. "About six miles. Think we should turn around?"

"Yeah, that might be a good idea," Kirk conceded. He was about to reach for his radio when a flash of glowing orange light caught on the opposite side of the road his attention. Jim narrowed his eyes and watched the area. When he saw the flash again against the pale white snow, he said, "Bones, slow down. Over there."

"You got something?"

"A flash of lights. Hazards, I think," Kirk replied, pointing toward the snow bank.

"I don't see anything," McCoy replied, easing his foot off the gas. He slowed to a halt and pulled off to the side of the road near the median. Leaving the car running, he peered through the window and out into the storm. "Are you sure, Jim? I don't see anything but snow."

"Look over there," Jim said. Leaning into his partner's personal space, he laid a hand on McCoy's left shoulder and pointed to a spot just behind the rear quarter panel of the car.

The sergeant followed Jim's finger and squinted through the wall of white. He was just about to tell Kirk he was full of shit and seeing things when a small flash of orange caught his attention. "Well, I'll be damned," he said, flipping on the light bars before he opened the door to step out of the car. McCoy winced when the cold wind and snow whipped against his face. He put his hand up in a futile effort to block some of the stinging sensation from reaching his eyes while he muttered about his own personal stupidity. He waited for Jim to join him in front of the car before the two patrol cops hopped the metal barrier in the median and carefully crossed the road.

Kirk pulled out his flashlight and looked to his right. Being hit by a car in the middle of a major interstate during a blizzard was not his idea of a good day. Seeing nothing, he trotted quickly across the road and toward the car. Jim let out a low whistle when he took in how properly stuck the car was.

"Government plates," McCoy said, pointing with his own flashlight. "I think these are our wayward federal agents."

As soon as the sentence was clear of McCoy's mouth, the doors on the driver's side of the car both popped open. Two people crawled out – one man about McCoy's size and build, and one very exotic looking lady. The pair was bickering loudly, pausing only to breathe as they stomped some of the snow out of their shoes. Bones reached behind his body to stow the flashlight while he cleared his throat to grab their attention.

The sandy-haired man turned his face toward the two Iowa City cops. He smiled brightly. "Oh, am I glad to see you fellas!"

"I'm sure you are," McCoy replied with a raise of his eyebrow and usual dose of heavy sarcasm. "And you are?"

"Tony DiNozzo, NCIS," he said, pulling out his ID and flashing it toward the Iowa City cops. Motioning toward his female companion, he said, "And this is Ziva David, whose perfect driving put us in the ditch without any means to call anyone to tell them we were stuck!"

"It is not all my fault, Tony!" she hissed back while she flashed her own badge and ID at the pair. Stepping closer to Tony, she said, "You forgot to charge your phone."

"And you broke yours when you crashed our car!" he fired back in the instant before the conversation between the two NCIS agents deteriorated into a finger pointing fight.

"Good God, you two. Four year olds at Christmas are better behaved," McCoy exclaimed with a shake of his head. He shifted his weight, leaning casually on one leg while he waited for the show to start. If the two NCIS agents wanted to kill each other in the middle of a blizzard, then by all means, he was ready to let them have at it. The only thing he was after was the front row seat to watch.

Next to the sergeant, the wheels in Kirk's head were turning, reaching a similar conclusion. He reached up and, just for propriety's sake, put one hand haphazardly in between the two combatants, simply so he could say he tried to prevent a fight from breaking out if they came to blows. Jim wouldn't bother to actually step in, but it would at least be documentable that he made a half-assed attempt. By the way the NCIS agents were arguing, it was clear they'd done it a time or two, and Kirk wasn't a man who was about to interrupt perfection. He'd leave Bones to do that.

Although highly amusing, the eventual need to get moving won out in the sergeant's head. Loudly so he could be heard over the roar of the argument, he said, "If you two children are done, I'd like to know why I've been dragged out in the middle of this crap to play fetch. And if your answer doesn't include 'crazy' or stupid,' you and I are going to have problems."

"Well, I'm not either of those fortunately," DiNozzo replied. "But the same can't be said for my very not-sane partner. Right, Ziva?"

The young lady sneered in Tony's general direction before she turned back towards the Iowa City cops. "I must apologize for my cohort's behavior. He is not partial to your state's weather patterns, though it appears you are not, either."

Jim rested his hands on the top of his duty rig before he turned the palm of his right hand up. "What's wrong with Iowa?"

"Plenty," McCoy groused as he dramatically turned over to a fresh page in the notebook he pulled out from his pocket. "But none of that is going to fix our problems now." He pointed to the car. "You'll get towed when the roads clear, but for now, you're coming with us."

"Gladly," Tony replied while he glared at Ziva. Walking to their car, he wrestled open the door to the back seat and pulled out his bag with his laptop and iPod. He slammed it shut and waddled toward the part of the road that _looked_ like it might not be comprised of only ice, tossing out, "At least they'll know how to drive in the snow!" in Ziva's general direction.

Kirk laughed out loud and pointed toward McCoy. "You're putting an awful lot of trust in a guy who saw snow for the first time when he moved here from the deep south."

Tony stopped and leaned against his car. He was trying to make it look suave, but really, the incredibly casual lean up against the Crown Vic's rear quarter panel was to help him from falling over. To McCoy, he asked, "And let me guess: you still hate winter."

"There isn't a strong enough word to describe how much I hate this shit," he groused. His boots were leaving big footprints, even in the deep accumulation, and wetness was beginning to seep through the seams. Snow was collecting on the collar of his jacket and in his hair, dripping down the back of his neck. Every few seconds, McCoy would bring his hand up to wipe the cold water off his face before he blinked furiously to clear his vision from the snowflakes invading it.

Kirk, for his part, pointed and laughed. Snow frosted off the points of his hair, making it look as if it was going from white to blonde. With his jacket open and without any gloves, Jim looked completely at home in the middle of a raging blizzard. "You've made your point, Bones. I get it. You hate winter. Let's get these guys back to the station and we can call it a night."

Tony grunted in approval, making his move toward the Iowa City cruiser. He slipped and slid across the pavement and hopped the median, cursing when snow invaded the inside of his shoes. The cold, melting snow soaked his socks and feet completely through. "Should have worn boots," he complained, shaking the snow off his very expensive and very Italian leather dress shoes.

Ziva walked smoothly past her partner, accentuating the ease of her movement through the snow with the flourish of a dancer. "I was smart enough to change my footwear before we left." She plopped Tony's sea bag at his feet. "Let's go."

"You guys will have to carry those on your laps. No room in the trunk," McCoy added while he shook off his jacket before he slipped into the driver's seat.

"I forgot about that part," Tony replied with a grimace while he thought back to how full he used to pack the trunk of the car when he was working patrol back in Baltimore. DiNozzo leaned down and picked up his bag with a sigh while he shot a glare in Ziva's general direction. Opening the door, Tony settled himself into the back of the cruiser and looked around. He shook the water from his hair and wiped the snowflakes out of his eyes. To David, he said, "Ever been in the back of one these things, Ziva?"

She crossed her arms over her chest. "No, but I would bet you have."

DiNozzo was about to take the bait, but he stopped just short of actually opening his mouth to do the talking. Now that he wasn't being assaulted by flying bits of frozen water, he paused long enough to tear his focus away from his partner. Tony narrowed his eyes while he cataloged the two faces of their rescuers. Even in profile, he knew he'd seen them before. Recognition floated through his features. Pointing, he said, "Wait a minute. I've seen you two before. You're Kirk and McCoy, aren't you?"

Jim was taken aback. Spinning in his seat, he asked, "How the hell did you know that?"

"We have nametags, genius," McCoy said, mumbling under his breath about the snow, horrible weather and wanton stupidity while he started the car. Out of courtesy, he turned the heaters on full blast, though the benefit wasn't entirely for the NCIS agents.

"Actually," Ziva said, pointing one slender finger toward the patrol officers while she smirked, "He is right. Jim and Leonard, yes?"

Kirk snorted. "She called you 'Leonard', Bones."

"Shut up Jim, or I'll bring Lucy with us tomorrow for patrol," McCoy threatened, low and menacing.

"Lucy?' DiNozzo questioned while he leaned forward to rest his forehead on the bars that separated the lawful side of the car from the lawless. His eyes bounced back and forth between Kirk and McCoy, taking in their opposite expression. "I don't want to know, do I?"

"No, you don't. Not at all," Jim answered. Curiously, Kirk turned toward Ziva and Tony. "Now, not that I'm disappointed to meet you, but how do you know who we are, and what do you need with us?"

"Melvin Jenkins," Tony answered succinctly, going from joking and carefree to strictly business.

McCoy's dark eyebrows furrowed while he pulled the car out on to the freeway. "What does NCIS need with a petty criminal? I thought you feds would be more interested in real crime, not D&Ds."

"We have unfinished business with the man. He's wanted in an outstanding NCIS case," DiNozzo said evenly in his best 'I'm a federal agent, so don't fuck with my authority,' voice. He had no expectation that the ambiguity would work; though he'd only spent a few seconds with the pair of patrol cops, he doubted someone as clearly cynical as McCoy would buy such an obvious deflection. Hell, Tony wasn't even sure he'd buy his own line, but he knew he had to at least make an attempt.

"Sounds like the classic bullshit they feed the cattle at the ranch, and I don't have time for it," McCoy grumbled while he shot Jim a glance. "Why don't you stop wasting your breath and tell me what this is really about?"

Tony sighed. He might act an immature child, but it was all a very elaborate smoke screen. His instincts were usually right on. Though they weren't as good as Gibbs' famous gut, they were damned close. In a more professional tone, he said, "Look, I don't want to insult you guys, and I'll tell you what I can, which isn't much." He looked down at his soaked shoes and shivered. "I'd just like to get changed and warm up a little first."

"That's it? Really, now. I might not be a fed, but I didn't fall off the truck yesterday." At a stoplight, McCoy twisted in his seat, putting himself face to face with DiNozzo. The sergeant searched Tony's face for any signs of deceit before he averted his gaze, though the warning look he shot Tony wasn't one of trust.

DiNozzo shifted; even though he didn't outwardly flinch, the way McCoy stared at him was eerily similar to the look he got from Gibbs the first time he tackled the man outside the infamous Baltimore warehouse. Tony covered his discomfort well then, and he was able to mask it again now, but the familiar feeling and sense of déjà vu brewing in his gut gave him the chills. He shared a glance with Ziva, and with the subtle eyebrow lift he saw grace her features, Tony knew the Israeli was thinking the same thing.

The car fell into a slightly terse silence while McCoy drove through the darkened and nearly deserted streets. Snow was already piling back up, though the plows had been through more than once. Wind whipped through the exposed areas, kicking up swirling clouds of white powder. The sergeant guided the car through an easy left hand turn while he said, "I would have expected a little more intelligence from the Navy's law enforcement."

"Bones!" Jim hissed. "Do you have to insult everyone we meet?"

"It's not insulting if it's the truth. Look at it out there. They drove through that just to question a petty criminal? I don't think so, and I know Lieu ain't going to go for it, either," he insisted.

"Your superior does not have to like it, but he will abide by it," Ziva said flatly from the back seat while she absently picked away at her nail. The light, teasing tone she employed while she and Tony bickered was gone, as was the mischievous glint to her eyes. Instead, her face was stony, rock solid and impassive. Her eyes, while still alive, were instead showing a blend of fiery contemptuousness that was both frightening and appealing.

"And I am telling you," McCoy started, accentuating the 'you' in the sentence, "That my superiors will not release Jenkins to you without a damned good reason. You haven't given me one yet, and I doubt you will."

"Well, I hope your boss has some big balls, because ours won't take no for an answer," DiNozzo said.

"Hmm. Indeed he will not. What is that expression, Tony?" Ziva asked, looking toward her companion. "Gibbs is like 'a dog with a bone,' yes?"

"Goddammit," McCoy cursed as he pulled the car into the underground parking lot. A pissing contest between his former partner and now boss and a couple of cocky NCIS agents was not what he needed on top of a raging snow storm. He parked, killed the engine and got out. Leaning on the open door, he jerked his head toward the restricted access door and said, "You three. Inside."

"We don't take orders from you," DiNozzo reminded McCoy with a hint of venom in his tone.

The sergeant wheeled back around and put himself right in DiNozzo's personal space. About the same height as the NCIS agent, McCoy glared into the other man's eyes for a couple of long, tense seconds. When Tony didn't back down, the sergeant said in a low and deadly tone, "My house, my rules. If you don't like it, walk your asses back to your car."

Tony raised his hands. "All right. No need to get your panties in a bunch," he said with a smile while he exchanged a surreptitious glance with Ziva.

McCoy growled, curled his lip and muttered something unintelligible under his breath before he spun on one heel and walked away. His footsteps clicked on the concrete of the city garage, and only when he heard the door shut did Jim allow his body to relax. Suddenly, he suddenly had a very strange feeling about the feds standing outside his cruiser. It was clear that his partner had reason not to trust them, but Kirk couldn't put his finger on why. All he knew was that they looked triumphant, like they'd won a battle they had yet to fight.

For all the bitching and the moaning he'd done earlier during the shift, Kirk was exceedingly glad he hadn't chosen to call in sick. His night officially went from boring to interesting in about five seconds flat, and he absolutely _loved_ it.

* * *

><p><strong>Next Up<strong>: Gibbs wonders how Tony and Ziva got themselves lost in a blizzard, and DiNozzo tries to make a friend out of McCoy.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Notes**: Thank you so much for the well-wishes on my father-in-law. He's doing better now, or, as well as can be expected after a heart attack. He's kind of an obstinate bastard who doesn't like change, so getting him to agree to change his lifestyle is going to be…fun. But now that we've gotten through what I hope is the major crisis, I'd like to be posting a bit more regularly. I've said my goal for this story is to have it completely posted by Christmas, and I think I can make it. Though this one is certainly not my favorite chapter in the story from a standpoint of well-written execution, it's necessary for the slight bit of plot I've got going here. As always, comments are loved (but never required). It certainly does give me just a little extra bit of motivation, though!

**Disclaimer**: Seriously? Do you all think if I owned either franchise, I'd be writing fic about it? No. Probably not.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 4<strong>

_Washington, D.C._

In Gibbs' mind, Tony DiNozzo's ass was officially grass.

One task. He'd been given one simple task – he was supposed to go to Iowa on what amounted to a game of fetch to bring back one material witness to NCIS, and DiNozzo couldn't even manage that. Gibbs shook his head. And this was supposed to be his senior field agent?

Giving his computer one final and properly hard smack when it wouldn't accept his password, Gibbs snarled in the general direction of the bullpen. "McGee! Have you heard from Ziva and Tony yet?"

The former probie tried his best not to wince at his boss' wanton technology abuse. McGee inwardly rolled his eyes, pushed his chair back and walked across the open space between his desk and his team leader's in order to prevent Gibbs from breaking yet another computer. He slid into the older man's chair, punched a couple of commands in order to access the BIOS and answered, "No, Boss. No answer on their cells, either."

"Call Cedar Rapids and find out if they've left yet," Gibbs ordered while he squinted hopelessly at his computer screen. Even after all the years of forced technology integration, he still thought the best cure for an uncooperative computer was a double tap to…whatever controlled the damned thing.

Tim sighed deeply, but exhaled slowly through his nose as to not draw attention to the frustration swirling between his ears. He didn't know of anyone on the face of the Earth whose presence in a room could make such a Charlie Foxtrot out of computer, other than Gibbs. Some days, it was downright irritating. With his back to his superior, McGee answered, "Already done it. They left hours ago."

"Well, where the hell are they?"

McGee struck 'enter' with more force than necessary before he stood up. "Beats me, Boss. I called the local LEOs and spoke to a Lieutenant Pike, and he assured me that he'd pass the word. He did say that that there were power and cell outages all over the area, so we shouldn't be worried if they haven't reported in."

"Did I look worried, McGee?" Gibbs asked, raising one eyebrow.

Tim stuttered. "Uh, no, but since you asked about them, I thought that you might be-"

"DiNozzo's a big boy. He can take care of himself. And Ziva will be just fine, as long as Tony doesn't push too many buttons," the team leader concluded. "If anyone should be worried, it's Tony. He's in for an ass kicking for taking this long."

McGee cleared his throat uncomfortably and fluttered one hand toward Gibbs' computer, hoping his fate wasn't similar to the one that was about to befall his senior field agent. "It's fixed now," he said before taking a seat at DiNozzo's desk.

Gibbs grunted, sat back down and reached into the drawer for the reader glasses he kept stashed under the pen tray. He flipped open a manila file folder on his desk and started to read it. "Keep me informed."

McGee nodded his acknowledgement and the two agents fell back into a comfortable silence. Tim tapped furiously away at the keys at DiNozzo's desk, his face a mask of abject concentration while Gibbs extracted all the information from the antiquated paper file. Without so much as looking up at his former probie, the team leader asked plainly, "Is there a reason you're at DiNozzo's desk, McGee?"

Even after several years on Gibbs' team, subjected to the team leader's monosyllabic way of communication and his go-for-the-jugular approach, it still unnerved Tim when he was put on the spot. It was like being back in eighth grade algebra when his teacher forced him to solve a problem using the quadratic equation on the board in front of the entire class. McGee felt his mouth go dry and his brain spun while he tried to think of something to tell Gibbs that wouldn't sound like _total_ bullshit. "Tony asked me to look at his computer while he was gone. He thought he might have picked up a virus again."

As a human lie detector, Gibbs was not convinced, though McGee was one of the worst in the business when it came to deception. Flatly, he surmised, "You're paying him back for listing your car for sale on that Greg-whatever, aren't you?"

"Craigslist?" McGee corrected.

"Yeah. That thing," Gibbs replied.

McGee had the good grace to blush. "Yes, Boss."

Gibbs smirked and twitched his head to the side while he reorganized the file on his desk, finally allowing some of the amusement to leech through to his face. "Better be a good prank."

"Oh, trust me. It is," Tim insisted as his boss walked over to hang over his shoulder. McGee's gaze flicked right, and just for a second, his fingers paused as he thought about what he was going to do. At Gibbs' approving glance, Tim smirked and doubled timed the typing.

"What are you doing?" Gibbs asked.

Tim entered a few commands and struck 'enter' victoriously. "I just reset Tony's desktop so none of his icons will work when he tries to access his computer."

Gibbs was characteristically perplexed. "How the hell can you do that? Lock them out?"

McGee snorted. "No, I made this easy for DiNozzo. I want him to eventually be able to figure it out, because I'm not going to help him after what he did to me." Tim motioned to the screen, a benign looking standard NCIS computer desktop, arranged in the way Tony liked it. "I just took a screen shot of Tony's desktop – uh, a picture."

"And did what with it, McGee?"

"I deleted all the icons and shortcuts, and set the picture as his desktop background so he'll think nothing's wrong when he sits down to work. But when he tries to click on the icon to launch the program, nothing will happen because there's actually no program there to launch," McGee extrapolated proudly while he demonstrated the non-working system. "It's so simple, it's brilliant."

Gibbs smiled proudly and clapped McGee on the back. "Get 'em with the headfake. Nice work, McGee," the team leader praised before heading back to his own desk.

The beaming smile plastered all over Tim's face would probably have not been removable by even the strongest set of pliers. Taking a triumphant sip of his water, McGee rubbed his hands together in anticipation. The phone to his left rang, interrupting his attempt at payback. "Very Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo's desk." McGee said a couple of words into the receiver and then set the handset back in the cradle. "Boss, that was the Director. He wants you up in MTAC."

Gibbs rolled his eyes and shoved the folder back into his top desk drawer. Wordlessly, he stood from his chair and made his way toward the steps that led up to the secured level of NCIS. Taking the stairs two at a time, Tim watched as Gibbs used the iris scanner and disappeared through the door.

McGee let out an unconscious sigh of relief directly before he went straight back to typing on Tony's computer. McGee made a couple of tweaks to his coworker's email settings for good measure to go with the already altered desktop, and, finishing his work, Tim was completely satisfied that he'd have DiNozzo monumentally confused when he finally returned from the barren wasteland that was the Midwest.

McGee felt his cell phone vibrate in his pocket, and pulling it out, he was greeted by Tony's caller ID picture. It was the one Abby took while she was testing out the camera on her phone right before the whole Maddie Tyler debacle began, and secretly, it was a McGee favorite. The rockstar image perfectly showcased everything DiNozzo – loud, obnoxious, over the top, but completely lovable (not that McGee would ever admit that last part). Tim smirked and dragged his finger across the iPhone while he said way too cheerfully, "Tony! How is it going in Iowa?"

DiNozzo returned McGee's smugness with a heavy dose of sarcasm when he replied, '_Oh, it's great, Probie. We've been stuck, harassed, heckled and to top it all off, the local LEOs think we're secretly here to take over the world, staring in Iowa. I'm telling you, this McCoy guy? Ass. Hole_.'

McGee rolled his eyes and set the phone on Tony's desk, tapping the 'speaker' icon while he was at it. He reclined in DiNozzo's chair and propped his feet up on the desk, making sure to drop as much slush and mud onto the surface as possible. Interlacing his fingers behind his head, Tim answered, "Why am I not surprised, Tony? You have a knack for pissing people off."

DiNozzo's outrage was nearly palpable. '_Me? I have a knack for pissing people off?_' he exclaimed. '_What about Ziva?_"

McGee snorted loudly into the phone. "What about Ziva? She's clearly taken lessons in something called diplomacy. Though, since that word is more than two syllables long, it's probably too big for you anyway."

DiNozzo paused before he hissed, '_I'm going to let that one go this time because you have experienced the coldest version of hell, but_ _I'm telling you, never come to Iowa. You might not make it out alive._'

"And some say that might be a good thing," Tim replied while he picked up Tony's famous Mighty Mouse stapler. "Are you going to will me your stapler? It's always been a favorite of mine."

'_Put it down, McGeek!_' Tony yelled.

McGee envisioned DiNozzo on the other end of the phone. Tony always talked with his entire body, phone conversations included. In his mind, Tim could see DiNozzo's hands practically reaching out as if he was going to grab hold of his subordinate, despite the fact that they were separated by a few thousand miles. McGee smirked. "Well, I could be persuaded to put your precious stapler back where I found it if you tell me why NCIS is now on yet another law enforcement agency's shit list. Other than just being you," Tim added.

The hustle and bustle of a busy police station was evident by the background noise that was coming through the phone. Tony must have pulled the receiver closer to his face, because his voice was louder when he replied a terse, '_How the hell should I know that, McGee? They just hate me!_'

Over his shoulder, Gibbs breezed back into the bullpen with his usual (and trademark) silent footsteps. McGee nearly jumped out of Tony's chair when the team leader quipped succinctly, "They don't hate you. They just want to shoot you. There's a big difference, DiNozzo. Now, what do you have on Jenkins and what's your status?"

DiNozzo cleared his throat on the other end of the phone while he recovered from the whiplash of being scolded yet again by Gibbs. '_Jenkins, Boss. Well, no progress. At least none yet. Have Probie pull up a weather map or something, because it is snowing like crazy here! Everything's at a standstill, and not even the Jimmy John's guys are running_.'

"DiNozzo!"

'_Right. Sorry, Boss_.' Tony took a deep breath and let it out slowly. '_We got stuck, no thanks to my partner's brilliant driving skills, and were rescued by none other than Jenkins' two arresting officers_.'

"Kirk and McCoy?" McGee clarified, though it was more for show than anything else. Smugly, Tim thought maybe there was a god after all.

Gibbs ignored the positively gleeful tone of McGee's voice and spoke to his agents as if he were dealing with a pair of children instead of a pair of highly trained field operatives. "What do we have so far?" he asked, slowly and deliberately.

'_Nothing_,' DiNozzo replied honestly. '_When I said nothing's moving, I mean nothing's moving, and that includes half the shift here in Iowa City. We've met Kirk and McCoy, but their CO, Lieutenant Pike, is stuck at home until the plows make it over to his house.'_

"We know, Tony. I talked to him a couple hours ago. He sounded pissed when we asked him to look for you guys," McGee replied rather matter-of-factly. "Probably why he sent Kirk and McCoy, especially if McCoy's as bad as you say he is."

'_Yeah, thanks for that, McGee,' _Tony started sarcastically as the pieces of the mental puzzle started to fall into place. '_Sergeant McCoy has a stick stuck so far up his ass, I'm surprised he can sit. Seriously, the man has a huge chip on his shoulder, and he's been giving me the silent treatment ever since he picked us up_.'

"See Tony? It's possible to express yourself without flapping your jaws constantly. Maybe you just have to get to know him," McGee said proudly while he simultaneously sat back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. Feeling a gaze on the side of his face, Tim allowed his eyes to slide right over toward his boss. "Not that it's bad to be a functional mute or anything," he stammered quickly.

'_There is no getting to know McCoy, and even if there was, I want no part in it. Do me a favor, Tim. Next time, if you send someone to rescue me, send someone who has more than a four word vocabulary!_' Tony countered while his voiced pitched up with each additional thought.

"If there is a 'next time,' DiNozzo, he leaves you in the snow bank alone with Ziva. My orders," Gibbs shot back while he glared at Tim's phone for all it was worth.

Tony could practically feel his boss' wrath radiating through the phone line, and he had no doubts that Gibbs was serious on his threat. DiNozzo shuddered inwardly when his ingrained sense of self-preservation kicked in. He refocused his attention on the case at hand and tried to wrestle the conversation back on track. '_They were going to send a cruiser over to the lieutenant's place to get him, but since it's not an urgent matter and Jenkins is a petty criminal, we're going to have to wait to talk to him. The desk sergeant thought it would be too dangerous to risk it, but he did say that Pike would be here as soon as he could get out of his driveway_.'

"What about the Chief or the Captain?" Gibbs asked, wondering if there was a way to speed up the process a little bit.

'_No go on that, Boss_,' DiNozzo answered. '_Pike's direct superior is in Des Moines for some law enforcement convention. He said he's deferring to his lieutenant, because it was Pike's men who arrested Jenkins in the first place_.'

"So they're passing him off," Gibbs concluded, muttering something about annoying law enforcement turf wars under his breath. Louder so both McGee and DiNozzo heard it, the team leader order, "DiNozzo, go harass someone until they give you what you want. You're good at being irritating."

'_I might actually take that as a compliment if I hadn't already tried_,' DiNozzo replied, flustered that his normal charm wasn't working on the streetwise patrol cop. '_Seriously, it's like the iceberg that hit the Titanic hit in here – cold And I mean that figuratively!_'

"What about Ziva?" McGee inquired.

'_I honestly have no idea where she is. As soon as Kirk and McCoy dropped us off here, she disappeared. She said she needed to find a new phone, since she broke hers when she crashed the car_.'

McGee's eyes lit up when he heard the partial story from DiNozzo, but before he could say anything else, Gibbs' voice cut him off. "DiNozzo, you sit your ass there and wait for Lieutenant Pike. I want to know as soon as he walks through that door."

'What am I supposed to do while we're waiting, Boss?' DiNozzo asked, though the tone that emanated from his throat sounded auspiciously like a whine.

Gibbs rolled his eyes. Sometimes, DiNozzo was the most exasperating man on the planet. "I don't know, Tony. Be creative. Keep pestering everyone until someone listens. There has to be more than one person there who knows about Jenkins."

'_I don't know how much pestering I can do before I wind up as Jenkins' cellmate, Boss. The locals aren't exactly giving us the warm and fuzzies here, and the last time I was in jail, it didn't go so well_.' DiNozzo involuntarily shuddered at the memories he had of some of his undercover operations gone wrong. If he was chained to a psychopathic criminal ever again in his life, it would be too soon.

"And how much of that is your fault, DiNozzo?"

Tony's silence on the other end of the phone spoke volumes.

"That's what I thought. Fix it! We need Jenkins here!" Gibbs ordered before he slammed his hand down on McGee's phone to end the call. It bounced three inches off the desk when the team leader retracted his hand. As Gibbs turned and walked away, Tim's treasured device flipped through the air before it landed on the desk with a loud clatter, leaving the owner gaping like a stuck fish.

Tim winced on behalf of his poor, abused phone and quickly scooped it up like he would a small, delicate child. He examined the device for any kind of damage and then ran a quick diagnostic on the software and hardware. He checked the functions, the processor and the memory before he was fully satisfied that Gibbs hadn't broken the thing. He watched Gibbs grab his coat, gun and badge and make a break for the elevators, presumably out for a coffee run. McGee sighed. It was barely hours into the week, and Gibbs was already righteously pissed. But, all things considered, it could be worse.

He could be DiNozzo.

* * *

><p><em><span>Iowa City, Iowa<span>_

At one of the random points along the line, Tony DiNozzo was convinced he'd missed connecting the dots when it came to his boss. He was one of the few people who had both the clearance and the balls to peek inside the personnel file of one Leroy Jethro Gibbs, USMC BAMF, NCIS MFWIC, and GIBBS with _two_ Bs. But even with his nearly photographic memory and sharp investigative mind, DiNozzo's brain could only come up with one logical conclusion: something was wrong. Really, _really_ wrong.

Tony was convinced Gibbs had a son, and his name was Leonard McCoy.

Ziva wandered off as soon as they made it back to the station, claiming she needed time to try and find a replacement phone. Kirk was…somewhere, though no one seemed too concerned that he decided to make himself scare. And that left Tony, all by his lonesome with the Iowa City sergeant. For the past half hour, DiNozzo sat, rather uncomfortably, in the one of the time out chairs reserved for Pike's guests, while he waited for the lieutenant to show up.

On the other side of the massive mahogany desk, McCoy stationed himself in his boss' chair, hands lightly grasping a coffee mug that would have supplied DiNozzo's caffeine intake for an entire week. Tony had plenty of time to study it – the mug proclaimed in big, bold letters, "Because I'm the sergeant, THAT'S why," which was oddly fitting of McCoy's no-bullshit approach. The sergeant said absolutely nothing; he drank down the small cask's contents in a way that could only be described as cool, calm and collected while he dissected the NCIS agents with his eyes.

Stir.

Sip.

Glare.

Repeat.

The feeling of being in the same room as McCoy was akin to the hair-raising panic that bubbled in his chest when DiNozzo realized Gibbs was standing right behind him, silently listening. Tony wasn't sure about Ziva's thoughts, but he privately wondered if Hannibal Lecter's victims felt the same tone of discomfort as he sitting in the same room with McCoy. The only difference, Tony eventually realized, was that Lecter's victims would soon be dead after the sensation of dread took hold in the pits of their stomachs. DiNozzo was certain that McCoy would drag it out, just for shits and giggles. The clock on the wall clicked out a cadence, and the sergeant fell in step right along with it as he lifted his arm and sipped his coffee.

"So," DiNozzo began, leveling his best interrogator glare at McCoy. "Are you planning on sitting there all night, staring me to death?"

The sergeant shrugged. "If it works."

For as much as McCoy reminded DiNozzo of a younger, snarkier, and darker haired Gibbs, Tony didn't spend the last eight years of his life with NCIS without learning a thing or two about firing back. Inwardly, he might be just a teensy bit intimidated, but he wasn't about to let McCoy see it. He relaxed his posture and turned his head towards the empty door. "Sorry to disappoint you, but I'm not going to spontaneously combust."

"My loss then," McCoy replied before taking another gulp of the black coffee.

Tony rolled his eyes. "Do you talk like this all the time?"

From behind him, another voice cut into the conversation. "Are you kidding me? Normally we can't get him to shut up. You should consider yourself lucky. Silence around this place is golden," Kirk proclaimed while he cleared the doorway of Pike's office.

Tony swiveled in his chair and watched as Jim Kirk breezed back into the office, the latter purposefully ignoring the death glare McCoy was sending his direction. Dressed similarly to DiNozzo's own casual and comfortable look, Kirk shucked his duty uniform in favor of a pair of dark colored jeans and a hooded Alpinestars sweatshirt. The stark white of the logo emblazoned on the back, a lower case letter 'A' leading into a five-point star, stood out against the black material of the sweatshirt itself. Tony nodded to the younger cop. "Officer Kirk."

"Agent DiNozzo," he replied, dropping into the chair next to Tony.

Tony pointed toward McCoy. "Your partner is convinced I need a babysitter." His eyes went hard before he added, "He thinks I'm a risk to your operation."

"You do, and your are," McCoy replied from behind Pike's desk. "Do I keep having to remind you where we found you?"

"Would you give that up? Seriously! One more time – Ziva was driving. Ziva is from Israel. And what is Israel? A giant desert! Does it snow in the desert? NO! So maybe now, if you'd, you know, connect the dots in your head, you can see how we ended up the way we did!" Tony exclaimed sarcastically while he waved his hands around in front of his face.

McCoy was unimpressed. Raising one eyebrow, he snipped, "Excuses are like assholes, Agent DiNozzo."

"Okay, you got me," DiNozzo began in his normal smart-assed, sarcastic fashion. "The whole silent and mysterious thing was great for the first five minutes, but now it's just getting old. I get that you don't trust us, but are you for real?" Tony asked before a loud crash and a bunch of yelling, all emanating from a point outside Pike's office, interrupted the rant that was about to tumble from his mouth.

Kirk and McCoy exchanged glances as a loud, authoritative and marginally profane female voice wafted through the doorway. Paling, they both stood and took several quick strides into the open section of the station. Tony got up and followed the Iowa City cops, tailing them by about a half stride as confusion washed over his face. DiNozzo followed the line of sight and watched as a slight, redheaded female cop dragged a handcuffed man through the station's front doors. She had a rough grip on her charge's shoulder and elbow, and while it seemed like he was willing to comply, she was pushing him into every hard surface available. Swearing and cursing abounded, from both suspect and captor.

Phrases like 'set up' and 'entrapment' and 'civil right violation' made it to DiNozzo's ears. He was about to roll his eyes in exasperation when Tony realized something was very off. While it was far from uncommon in the law enforcement community to hear the terms tossed about with such flippancy, the collective reaction by the station's occupants was much more telling. The seas parted in front of the pair, and it appeared that no cop or administrative support staff was willing to stand in the young woman's way. Tony furrowed his brows, watching intently as the faces of both Kirk and McCoy darkened with what could only be described as unbridled rage.

The spectacle of cop and detainee moved into the bowels of the station for processing, and with it, the entire place seemed to breath a sigh of relief. Two sets of shoulders, one belonging to the sergeant and the other to his partner, fell before the two men shared a knowing look. Nodding silently to DiNozzo, the trio turned and walked back into Pike's office, taking up the same positions they'd previously occupied. McCoy dropped his head into his hands and rubbed at his tired face while Kirk simply shook his head.

Ziva's light footsteps gave away her presence. Pointing toward the squad room area, she asked the million-dollar question that was on the tip of DiNozzo's tongue. "Would someone care to tell me just what that was all about?"

McCoy rubbed his temples before he replied very sarcastically, "Agent DiNozzo, Agent David, you've just met Lieutenant Melissa Schmidt, one of the fine upstanding officers from the Iowa City PD."

Ziva was taken aback. "She is a lieutenant? That does not bode well for you."

Jim connected the mental dots. "No, it's not like that. She's not our best example of the brass around here. Pike's a good man, and you'll realize that as soon as you meet him. Schmidt is – I don't know how to say it." He sighed, thought and settled on, "Let's just say I hope that it's not her backing me up if I ever need assistance."

DiNozzo nodded silently while he swallowed back the lump in his throat. He'd had his share of dirty cops to last him the rest of his life, and though sometimes the NCIS team got on his every last nerve, he was glad to say that he knew they were all an honest, good bunch. He trusted them with his life, and he couldn't fairly say that about his previous law enforcement job. While he knew Gibbs often blurred the lines of legality, he also understood that the team leader would never do it unless the ends justified the means. It didn't make it right, but there was never anything in it for him, just for the outcome he knew needed to happen. Tony felt Ziva's hand brush his shoulder; it appeared that he and his Israeli partner shared a wavelength similar to that of Kirk and McCoy. He cleared his throat and asked, "If she's as bad as I think you're implying, and I'm pretty sure that she sucks, how is she still on the force, let alone in a set of lieutenant bars?"

McCoy scoffed. "You've got me. I don't know how she does it, but I think it's just because everyone is afraid of her."

"With the way you talk, I didn't think you had the make up to be afraid of anything," Tony said to McCoy without fully thinking it through.

"I'm not stupid and I'm not reckless, Agent DiNozzo. I want to make sure I go home at the end of the night, same as you," McCoy insisted sharply as his intense gaze turned toward the NCIS agent. "I just know when something ain't right, and there's a lot wrong there."

"We really think it sucks there's not a damned thing we can do about it," Kirk added glumly from his position in the chair next to Tony.

Tony's eyes lit up. "The Code?" DiNozzo replied in askance.

"The Code," Kirk answered with a nearly defeated sigh.

"Man, I hate dirty cops," DiNozzo admitted honestly. "You'd think that we would have more integrity than that."

"You and me both," Kirk answered. "In fact, I think I can speak for all of us when we say we all hate dirty cops, and I don't think they come much dirtier than Schmidt."

"Oh, I highly doubt that," Ziva insisted with a heavy scoff. Next to a somewhat surprised McCoy, she perched herself on the edge of the desk, allowing her feet to dangle freely from the side. "We operate in Washington, D.C. It is a haven for corruption, or so I am told."

"Yeah, our job, among other things, is to clean house for the SECNAV. Sometimes that's great, and other times, not so great," DiNozzo added.

"SECNAV?" Kirk asked, confused.

"Secretary of the Navy, or the civilian suit in charge," McCoy clarified before Ziva or DiNozzo could even open their mouths. He sent a passive shrug toward the shocked federal agents and added, "First partner did two tours as a Marine."

"Ah," Tony replied. He shifted in his chair and rested his elbows on his knees. Dropping his head, DiNozzo quipped, "But I'll bet the Corps never left him."

"Not at all," McCoy replied with a loud snort. A tiny, minute smirk tried to escape his lips before he stamped it back down, but it was too little, too late. The sergeant knew both Ziva and Tony saw it, and McCoy cursed himself under his breath for allowing it to slip.

Jim, meanwhile, was more than amused. He thought that Agent DiNozzo seemed like a pretty decent guy, and Agent David intrigued him as more than just a sexual conquest. And since they had plenty of time to kill, he figured getting to know the pair couldn't really be a bad thing. Maybe they weren't so different after all…

Kirk was about to ask a question when Ziva's voice cut into the conversation. "By the way you act, Sergeant, I would have concluded that you were the one that served, not your former partner."

"I joined when they put me with him," McCoy answered, strangely paralleling something Tony once said about working with Gibbs.

"You and me both," DiNozzo added in gest from his chair.

The sergeant met Tony's eyes and softened his gaze momentarily. The expression that passed through his face was one of mutual sympathy; in one look, DiNozzo realized that McCoy understood on a level that no one else could what it was like to work with a personality who was driven by perfection and expected the best from himself and those around him. But just as quickly, the stony façade returned when narrowed his eyes and took another sip of his coffee. "But it doesn't mean I like you."

"I would never conclude something that stupid, Sergeant," DiNozzo replied through a laugh.

McCoy shrugged and lifted his coffee mug to his lips. After he took another long pull, he admitted, "I might have been wrong about you. Maybe you are a little smarter than those suits in Washington that purport to run our country."

Ziva recognized the opening McCoy inadvertently offered for what it was and grabbed onto it before he closed the door again. It was nice, she decided, hearing he speak more than four words at a time. "Mmm. Tony, I think the Sergeant is not a fan of Washington," she stated from her seat on the desk. She looked down at the sergeant while he averted his eyes, the latter reddening slightly at being caught enjoying the conversation.

McCoy cleared his throat. "I'm not a fan of politics of any kind, no. Damned idiots spend more time arguing like a bunch of petulant schoolchildren instead of just getting the work done like we have to do in the real world."

"There are very few people who would contradict you on that front. And they wouldn't be lying to you either, just to keep you from ripping their heads off," Tony said, unable to keep the extra but light hearted barb at the end of the sentence from spilling out of his mouth. It was law enforcement, and little jabs at his fellow officers were a right of passage. There was something about being in a police station that brought it out full force, though DiNozzo was at a loss to explain what exactly _that_ was.

Kirk's eyes widened as he processed what DiNozzo just said. He was ready to do whatever it took to prevent World War III from breaking out in his lieutenant's office when his partner undoubtedly hurdled Pike's desk and jumped the NCIS agent. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Agent David was preparing to do the very same thing to protect her partner. At minimum, they might be able to run interference long enough to get someone else's attention for help. Kirk felt his hamstrings tighten in anticipation as he prepared to leap from his chair. His heart sped up and his palms started to sweat as he watched a few choice emotions roll over his partner's face.

But, McCoy's reaction surprised the entire group. Instead of clearing the desk and going straight for DiNozzo's neck, the sergeant actually laughed. "Finally! Something we can agree on!" he said while his face cracked a genuine smile.

Ziva let out the breath she was unconsciously holding. It would not be a fun phone call to make if she was forced to report to Gibbs that DiNozzo was in jail in Iowa City because he got in a fight with their suspect's arresting officer. Her eyes darted from Kirk's equally relieved face to that of McCoy, and she was amazed how much younger the latter looked when he wasn't scowling as if he were trying to ward off evil with just his eyebrow alone. Belatedly, she wondered if Rule #12 would apply to the Iowa City sergeant, but shrugged off the thought as nothing more than passing curiosity.

With a marginally happier sergeant, the air and feeling in the office seemed to lighten considerably, and DiNozzo thought it might be a good time to test the boundaries of McCoy's tolerance. Using one foot, Tony reached over and closed the door, hoping for some more privacy in a very transparent station. "So, Schmidt. Can we go back there? What are we talking about with her? Excessive force? Kickbacks? What?"

McCoy shook his head. "I don't speculate because the less I know, the better off we are. I have my theories, but it's nothing but conjecture."

Reading between the lines, DiNozzo got what the other man was not really saying. McCoy knew exactly what Schmidt was doing, but he couldn't prove it, and talking would only lead to trouble for him and his partner. He saw the look that passed from McCoy to Kirk when Jim's head was turned. Tony could see easily how much they cared about one another, and he could also tell that McCoy felt responsible for Kirk. They were as tight as he was with his own NCIS team, and DiNozzo also knew how much havoc a higher-ranking officer could wreak on the lives of her subordinates. Clearly, Kirk and McCoy were good, clean cops who didn't want to find themselves sucked into the maelstrom of shit an officer like Schmidt could generate.

Ziva nodded her head in shared supportiveness, noting the way the tension in the room ratcheted back up with Schmidt's appearance. "I understand the complexities of politics inside an organization such as your or ours, and we will let the subject drop. Right, Tony?" she asked, nudging her partner's leg.

He nodded and forced out a smile, though in his mind, DiNozzo was busy filing away information for use at a later date. He put a trademark smile on his face before he looked directly at Kirk and McCoy and said, "Yeah, that's cool. But can we move on to the bigger question here?"

"What's that?" McCoy asked.

Tony and Jim exchanged glances while Kirk answered, "What the hell are we going to do while we're stuck here at the station?"

That was a good question, and one McCoy hadn't stopped to consider. While he was fine sitting back with nothing but a cup of coffee and one of the books he kept stashed in his locker while he waited out the storm, it didn't occur to him that his partner wouldn't be nearly as patient. And now, with the appearance of the NCIS agents, Len wasn't sure he actually wanted to know how Jim planned on remedying his boredom. His eyes darted back and forth between Kirk and DiNozzo's faces before he said, "I don't know what's worse: the fact that we're here in the middle of a blizzard, or that you two seem to reading each other's thoughts."

"And they have only known one another for an hour. This is not good," Ziva whispered into McCoy's ear. "I have stories I could tell you, but they would only serve to frighten you." She straightened her posture and crossed her arms over her chest. "We will simply have to watch them."

McCoy pursed his full lips and leaned back in Pike's chair. "Yeah, that's what I was afraid of."

"Mmm," she replied as she watched DiNozzo and Kirk properly introduce themselves in the animated way unique to their startlingly similar personalities. "Me, too."

* * *

><p><strong>Next Up<strong>: Ziva and McCoy go to dinner. No, really. It's just dinner, despite what Kirk might think.


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Notes**: This chapter is by far my favorite in the entire story. It's also the start of the very unexpected development of Ziva/Bones UST. Like, you guys have no idea. I never intended for these two to get along so well, but as I wrote, it just kind of happened. So I rolled with it. And while their relationship will never progress any farther than that of just really good friends (Bones will eventually find himself a woman in the cop!verse, but not yet), it was an fun dynamic to play with during this story. As always, comments are loved, but not required. Enjoy it

**Disclaimer**: Nothing recognizable is mine, only the cracky idea for the so-called plot. No money made here. I do this for fun. Please don't sue.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 5<strong>

_Iowa City, Iowa_

The bastards lied.

Again.

It boggled McCoy's mind that the scientific community accepted meteorology as a valid profession of the field. Nowhere else on the planet existed a job that allowed for educated guesses. And when they were wrong? Well, it was no big deal. Off by a few degrees? No problem. Get a bit more rain than originally expected? That was okay. If it snowed harder than expected? Well, it was just an extra excuse to keep people indoors.

It really wasn't that he hated winter itself, contrary to the popular belief around the force. Coming from a place where 'cold' was defined as fifty degrees, the awe factor of a snowy white Midwestern winter still hadn't completely worked its way from his ingrained Georgian roots. No, what McCoy hated was the stupidity that snow storms inevitably seemed to foster, which always got worse as the amount of snow increased. The end result was normally a very tired and a cranky-beyond-words sergeant that no amount of coffee could possibly cure. Logically, he knew his anger was simply transference, but frankly, he was too irritated to give a shit even if it was the Pope himself he was insulting.

In the middle of a blizzard, even the simplest of tasks were exponentially complicated. Take food, for instance. He and Kirk hadn't eaten since the middle of their shift, and Len's rumbling stomach made it clear that some mystery meat slapped between two pieces of stale bread after being infinitely wrapped in cellophane, purchased from the vending machine's 'Wheel of Death' was not going to hold him over until morning. The good news was there were a couple of places within walking distance that were open. The bad news was that the door closest to the little Italian place across the street was blocked shut by the rapidly accumulating snow.

Short of using an RPG to blow a new hole in the wall (which he was sure Chief Barnett wouldn't quite appreciate), McCoy's options were walk all the way around the building to the back side of the street through the elements in order to get his food, or wrestle the back door open. He'd chosen the latter, but now, he was wondering if perhaps the longer walk was worth preserving his sanity, and his shoulder. Pike just might be right – Kirk's stubborn impulsiveness could be rubbing off. He shook his head and dismissed the thought as quickly as possible. No, that would be the end of all ends, and the sergeant knew Jim would never allow him to forget it.

McCoy braced himself. Like a defensive back itching for an explosive tackle, he planted his feet, lowered his center of gravity, and exploded up and out toward the unfortunate victim of his wrath. With each hit, his shoulder got sorer, but the door never budged.

"Goddammit!" he cursed, rubbing the sore spot of contact while he stepped back to re-assess his strategy. McCoy laid his hands on his hips and glared for all his worth at the barrier between him and dinner.

From the doorway leading to the station's tertiary exit, a soft but forceful female voice said, "Your center of gravity is too high. You must bend your knees more and get lower."

McCoy growled and gave the door one more solid push. He shook his head against the futility that mocked him, and, without turning to face the NCIS agent, he replied, "I played football, Agent David. I know how to move the sled."

"Though I am uncertain as to what you mean by 'moving the sled,' I can see that your technique is not working. I am merely trying to help. That is all, Sergeant," she replied, stopping about five feet from McCoy's back.

The man's posture deflated and he leaned wearily up against the door. It'd been entirely too long of a day; he was tired, cranky and sore, and he hadn't yet reconciled just what the feds were after in his head. But, Ziva was making an effort to at least be friendly, and the part of his brain that was still working recognized it wasn't fair to take out his frustrations solely on her. Finally, he turned around and let his shoulder blades fall against the metal separating the station from the howling storm. McCoy's head tipped backwards in defeat as he swallowed a couple of times and sucked in a greedy breath. He tipped his eyes down toward Ziva and replied, "Given the circumstances, I think you can call me Bones. 'Sergeant' makes me feel old."

"'Bones'?" she asked with a raised eyebrow and a devious smirk. "I do not understand."

McCoy shook his head. "That stupid nickname is Jim's doing, and it goes back when we were first partnered up." He held up one finger when Ziva took a breath prior to asking a question. "No. Before you even say it, don't bother asking – you're not getting the story why."

"I admit that I am curious about the reasoning behind such a distinct name, but I will respect your wishes. Perhaps in time," she said, laughing lightly at the slightly embarrassed expression on his face.

"I don't think so," he replied with a grimace. "Too much ammo there if that really got out to the masses."

"It is that bad, yes?" she asked.

"Worse."

Ziva smirked. Initially, she wondered what she'd done to piss him off, but the more time she spent around McCoy, the more she realized that the crabbiness was mainly a front. In that respect, Bones (God, that name just sounded weird) was much like Tony – very capable and competent, though he preferred to hide that fact in plain sight. The two men just chose different paths to achieve their ultimate goal. Ziva leaned against the wall and rested her head on the doorframe. "What is the reason you are attempting to open this particular door? Surely there are others you could use."

McCoy shrugged helplessly. "I'm hungry, and this is the most direct route to Ribisi's. Little Italian place across the street with the best veal parmesan in town," he said, pointing to a small green, red and white neon sign just barely visible through the snow.

Ziva joined McCoy at the window. Up to that moment, she wasn't feeling particularly hungry. But the mention of food reminded her how long it'd been since she'd eaten, and her stomach growled loudly in agreement. Laughing she said, "I think my stomach is siding with you. Would it be too forward of me if I asked to accompany you?"

McCoy shrugged before he lifted his eyes to meet Ziva's gaze. "And turn down intelligent conversation and someone who actually chews their food and isn't afraid of vegetables? Hell, no. It would be my pleasure," he said before he looked back at the door, pounding on it with the open palms of his hands. "That is, if we can find a way to get out of here."

"This reminds me of the time I was stuck in a shipping container with Tony. I was new to NCIS, and we somehow managed to find ourselves locked in. We were there for hours before our boss finally found the clues we were leaving for him," she said absently while she peered out the frost-stained window.

"And your partner's still alive? You have more self control than me, lady," McCoy replied, wiggling the door ineffectually one last time before he gave it a solid kick.

She threw her head back and laughed. "Restraint was hard, but I did it only because I knew we would need the bullets for the real threat outside the container. We locked ourselves in with an arms dealer's profits, and when we started burning the money, he was, how shall I say it? Less than thrilled." Ziva examined the window with the trained eyes of a seasoned escape artist and, with a couple of quick twists of her wrists, pulled the screen free and popped the window up. She leaned it up against the wall and stepped back, smug. "I was certain that there is more than one way out of this building."

"What the hell is wrong with using a door?" McCoy groused while he studied the distance from the floor to the bottom of the windowsill. He could comfortably rest his elbows on the base, and he wondered how he was supposed to get his leg up high enough without hurting himself. It was physically impossible. Bones did a double take when, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ziva practically do the splits, prop one foot on the sill, grab the sides of the window frame and haul her lithe body up, all in one fluid motion. "That's not right," he said, pointing with one incredulous finger as he gaped at her easy movement. "If I tried that, EMS would be prying me off the floor with backhoe."

Squatting in the window, Ziva spun back around on one foot in tuckstand and simply smiled. She motioned with one hand and said, "Once upon a time, I was a dancer – ballet. Flexibility and balance are some of the perks. Come on. I will help you." She scooted over to one side of the space, reached out her hand and heaved the much larger man up. As graceless as she was graceful, McCoy shimmied and cursed his way up and through the opening, only to land in a heap on top a large pile of snow just below their exit.

"I hope you considered how we're going to get in when we're done, because I'm not sure I'll make it back through that window," he said with a glare toward the offending brick while he dusted off his pants. Shaking off the cold, melting snow from his hands, the sergeant pulled the large chopper gloves out of the pockets of his North Face parka and put them on. At the same time, he pulled the hood up over his head and glared out at the elements. "God, I hate winter. I must be crazy."

"Or hungry," she supplied. "I have worked with men my entire life, and if there is one thing I have learned, it is that you think with your stomachs. Well, that and other things," she said slyly with a flick of her eyebrows.

"No, that's my partner," McCoy quipped as he reached up over her head and pulled the glass partition of the window closed. He checked it twice to ensure that it stayed unlocked before he turned back toward Ziva. "I don't think the station is in any danger of being invaded in this," he said as the pair set off through the storm.

Ziva, even in her boots, discovered that finding her footing was difficult. The snow was thick and heavy, and the displaced slush from the few cars that drove by was quickly refreezing courtesy of the sub-zero wind. It crunched uncomfortably under her feet, and more than once, she felt her ankle nearly roll when she took a misstep. "This is truly horrible weather," Ziva stated rather succinctly, squinting to keep the snow from attacking her eyeballs too terribly.

McCoy grunted and pushed forward. Never had a trip across the street seemed so insurmountably far. After dodging snow banks and weathering the constant assault of snow, he finally reached the front entrance to Ribisi's. He stood under the overhang, grateful for the small recessed area of the door that shielded him from the howling wind. McCoy shook off his jacket while he waited for Ziva and held open the door for her after she finished brushing off the accumulation from her clothes.

"I cannot believe they are actually open in this! If this happened in D.C., everything would be shut down!" Ziva exclaimed, stomping the snow from her boots as she looked around inside her new surroundings. The red carpet that met the tile on which she was standing was worn in some places, but still very clean. Looking farther, she let her eyes roam past the large reception and waiting area, a small counter with barstools sat opposite the open kitchen. To the left of the counter, the restaurant itself was made up decorative etched glass carvings, all inlaid into deep walnut colored wood booths as privacy screens. Ziva supposed that if it were daytime, the sunlight streaming in would illuminate the entire room, making the place positively glow. It was welcoming, and with each passing second, she was silently cheering McCoy's choice for food.

Mike Ribisi, second-generation owner and front man for the restaurant, sauntered out from behind the counter. He slapped the sergeant on the back with one broad palm and smiled brightly through the dark moustache adorning his upper lip. "McCoy! How you doin' tonight?" he greeted, grabbing Len's outstretched hand and while he pulled the man into a brief masculine hug. He turned his head toward Ziva and looked her up and down appreciatively. "And who is this? New face in town I hope?" he asked warmly.

Ziva regarded the portly, dark-haired, middle-aged man. Clearly, McCoy (and probably the entirety of the police department) was a regular at the small, cozy restaurant, and the reception Ribisi gave the sergeant made her wonder just how often he ate there. Resolving to find out more about her impromptu dinner partner over a bowl of pasta, she extended her hand in greeting. Succinctly, she said, "New face, yes, but permanent? No. I am Special Agent Ziva David of NCIS. I came to pick up a prisoner, though it seems I am now at the mercy of your Midwestern weather.

"Changes on a dime, doesn't it?" Ribisi laughed as he gave her a giant bear hug as well. Stepping back, he waved a hand. "Ah, it's okay. You learn to love it. Eventually, you wonder how anyone lives in a place without four seasons."

"I've been here almost ten years, and I don't wonder. I still hate winter," McCoy grumbled under his breath.

"You just hate the cold, Len. Come on – it's not polite to lie in front of the ladies. Be honest!" Ribisi lightly taunted while he lightly nudged the sergeant with his elbow. Looking McCoy up and down, he motioned with his arm. "Go and sit. Relax and take a load off. I'll bring you guys some water and a menu for the new kid in town," he said before walking off in the other direction to fetch some flatware for the table he knew the sergeant preferred.

"Thanks, Mike," McCoy replied, placing the fingertips of his right hand lightly against the small of Ziva's back. The gesture was force of habit; chivalry was an ingrained part of his psyche, even if it was a little rusty courtesy of Jim. He steered her gently toward the back of the restaurant and pointed toward a booth tucked away from the main portion of the seating area. Ziva's expression caught his attention when the NCIS officer turned her head, smirked and raised an eyebrow at her counterpart. He'd never seen anyone who could talk more with her eyes than she, and McCoy could only describe her countenance as 'fiery'. Embarrassed, he quickly pulled his hand down and cleared his throat.

Grinning to herself, Ziva sat down on the fluffy red booth cushion. Though it was deserted as a result of the storm, she could close her eyes and imagine the hustle and bustle of the intimate little restaurant when lunch and dinner were in full swing. Accepting the water and the menu from Mike with a nod and a, "Thanks," she began to peruse her options. Everything looked positively scrumptious, and her stomach gave another loud growl of defiant reminder. She settled on a hearty plate of chicken fettuccini with a homemade pesto and a glass of house chardonnay before Ziva handed the menu back to Ribisi. She carefully picked up the water glass and took a couple of small sips while she regarded the man across from her with the practiced eyes of a seasoned investigator. "You must come here often," she began, looking for neutral ground.

McCoy was doing his best to remain professional while he kept up his (failing) pretense of Iowa City sergeant. "Once a week usually," he replied passively.

"Alone?" Ziva couldn't help but ask as the question nearly tumbled off her tongue. Normally, she liked to get a feel for her company before she went for in for the kill. This time, it appeared that her subconscious decided that it would appropriate to dive straight in. The forthright nature of the query surprised even the NCIS agent; Ziva hadn't expected to be so blunt, even if it was her style when it came to dealing with others.

McCoy's long fingers twitched while he reached for a chunk of French bread from the basket Mike left in the middle of the table. Silently, he broke off a piece and slathered it with butter before sprinkling a little parmesan cheese on top with some hot pepper flakes. He stuffed the lot into his mouth, using the time as a convenient way to avoid answering Ziva's question. When she remained quiet, patiently waiting for his response, McCoy sighed and hoped his answer didn't sound _too_ damned pathetic. "Alone? Sometimes, yeah. I have to decompress somehow, and the ways I used to do it weren't exactly healthy," he frankly stated, motioning with his hands toward her glass of wine.

Well, that answered a lot of questions. Ziva suddenly felt very self-conscious about her choice of beverage. So naturally self-assured, she wondered why the tingly, foreign feeling of doubt was bothering her so copiously. It hadn't on virtually every other occasion, and Ziva was curious to figure out why this particular moment was the one that her psyche chose to care that she might be making McCoy uncomfortable. She raised an apologetic hand before she stammered out, "I am sorry. I did not realize that you are recovering. It was not my intention to rub sand in an open wound-"

"Salt."

"What?" she asked inquisitively, stopping the flow of words from her mouth in mid-sentence while she tilted her head to the side.

The sergeant reached across the table and picked up the salt shaker. Bringing it up to their eye levels, he held it there and said, "Salt. It's not nice to rub salt in open wounds. Sand has nothing to do with it," he said, placing the shaker back on the table. He leaned back in his chair and picked up the water glass, draining it in one long gulp.

"Yes, sand, salt. The difference is very minor, though it appears my grasp on American slang is still lacking." Ducking her head, Ziva leveled her gaze up at McCoy's face and said, "Regardless, that is not an excuse. I am a trained investigator. I should have known."

McCoy snorted out loud. "What, that I crawled inside a bottle and ran away from my problems? You're good, Agent David, but you're not that good. Besides, if I thought being around a glass of white wine would be an issue, I wouldn't be out here with you. I know my triggers, and right now, this ain't one of them."

Ziva let out a sigh of relief. For some unknown reason, she truly enjoyed the sergeant's company. His no-bullshit way of looking at life reminded her distinctly of Gibbs, and that character trait was one of the many reasons she respected her boss so decisively. She forced a smile and said rather lamely, "I am happy that you have managed to control…it."

McCoy actually laughed while he leaned forward in interlaced his fingers. Sincerely, he answered, "I'm past the eggshells phase of recovery. Drink your wine. After a night like this, I'm sure you could use it. You're not going to bother me."

"You are positive?" she asked him, raising one speculative eyebrow. "And please, call me Ziva."

"As a heart attack, Ziva."

Nodding her head, she leaned back in the booth and crossed her legs, taking a long sip of the surprisingly tasty wine. He was right – after today, she really felt like she needed to properly unwind. And since the station was fresh out of bubble baths and cheesy romance novels, a glass of wine and some Italian with one of the local LEOs was going to have to suffice. Still though, it didn't mean that she had to make said company uncomfortable, even if he insisted to the contrary. It was only polite, after all. Thankfully, Ribisi arrived with their food shortly after and offered refills on their beverages. Ziva was ready to give the sergeant a break and move the conversation back to a more neutral ground. "So, Melvin Jenkins?"

"What about him?" McCoy asked while he cut a big chunk off the piece of veal Parmesan set out in front of him. The mozzarella was bubbling and golden brown on the top, and when he stabbed the cut piece, the cheese stretched off in strings. McCoy twirled the fork around several revolutions before the stray piece finally snapped off. He shoved contents of his fork into his mouth and chewed quickly, mindful that the food was still damned hot.

"Do you know him?" Ziva replied, looking up from her plate of pasta. She was cutting her food at a much more sedate pace while she tried not to laugh at the way he was practically inhaling his dinner. Finally, a very slight giggle worked its way up from her throat, launching past her lips. Ziva covered her mouth quickly, but McCoy's keen hearing picked up the sound.

"What?" he asked innocently though a mouthful of marinara and mozzarella.

"Nothing," she replied, laughing. Not that she'd ever tell him, but the look on his face was past the point of comical. The wide, surprised expression was innocent, and completely contrary to his rather gruff persona. Ziva cleared her throat in an attempt to even her voice before she added, "It appears that your partner has rubbed off you, and I do not mean that in a good way. Did you even taste any of what you just ate?"

McCoy's fork made it halfway from the table to his mouth with a piece of veal parmesan stuck on the spiky prongs. He paused when he realized that half his dinner was gone, and that he'd swallowed a good portion of it practically whole. Bristling, he retorted, "Well, I wouldn't be so damned hungry if someone," he said, motioning toward Ziva with his fork, "Didn't need to be rescued from a snow bank. So, this is technically your fault, Agent David."

"Oh, it is my fault? I hardly think so!" she replied with an airy laugh. Ziva simply stared at McCoy in the mischievously fun way she often did with DiNozzo when she was trying to be purposefully ambiguous. The harmless banter was a way to ease the tension of the job, and Ziva knew McCoy understood that. But, she thought, there was still the matter of agency pride. She mentally resolved that she was not going to admit fault, even if, logically, she was the one on the hook.

On the other side of the table, McCoy simply rolled his eyes and dug right back into his dinner. He chewed and checked his watch, grimacing when his eyes registered the time. His face faltered slightly while he gnawed on the inside of lip, thinking. After a long pause, a low rumble vibrated through his chest before he begrudgingly admitted, "It doesn't excuse your piss-poor driving, but if we hadn't picked you up, Jim and I would still be out fighting the elements."

"Are you thanking me?" she asked, surprised.

"No," was his quick, flat reply. "I'd never do something like that."

She laughed. "I am sure not, but I do think you would have probably thought of seventeen different reasons to kill your partner by now, yes?" Ziva asked.

"Seventeen? Try seven hundred," he retorted.

"I was trying to be nice, even though I can see you are not what is called 'P.C'. If you prefer, I can be more forthright." Ziva folded her hands together and rested her chin on her fingers while she waited for McCoy to respond. The proud grin she received back from the sergeant was confirmation of her suspicions, and the accompanying expression that adorned his face was one that, up until three seconds ago, she was unsure he could actually perform. A sly glint shone in his green eyes, and the half-smirk creeping up McCoy's lips could only be described as boyish and quite possibly flirty. He looked impossibly young when he did it, and Ziva caught herself wondering why he didn't smile more often.

"You're a good read, Agent David. Never been accused of being nice," he said, taking a deep breath while he cut up the last of his veal and stuck the remaining piece into his mouth. McCoy pushed his plate forward and stared at his counterpart before he added, "And that brings me back to Jenkins."

"What about him?" she asked vaguely. When Ziva looked up from her plate of pasta, she noticed that all traces of relaxation he sported during the first half of their conversation were gone. Instead, Sergeant McCoy was firmly back in place, and with it, the cynicism and suspicion that alienated him from his peers, but also made him a good cop. She sighed inwardly while she put her fork down and sat back. "It is clear you have questions," she stated flatly.

McCoy nodded his head, impressed at how fast Ziva went from relaxed and carefree to seasoned, hardened federal agent. She was as good, if not better, than he and that was an impressive feat in and of itself. He narrowed his eyes at her before he asked, "What are you guys really up to?"

"If you are asking what ulterior motives we have, the answer is none. We are simply here to escort the accused back to NCIS for further questioning."

"For what?"

"He was a material witness in a case involving drug trafficking on Navy ships. Initially, he was mum when he was asked who else was involved, but a few months in Leavenworth seemed to have altered his perception. He agreed to name names, but he took off before he gave up the information to the US Attorney. She was less than pleased," Ziva exposed quickly.

McCoy was not satisfied, and he was going to keep fishing until he got what he wanted to hear. He cocked his head to the side before he said, "You two are overkill – you and your partner. Why didn't your agency just order extradition back to D.C. from here for Jenkins? Why did you fly a few thousand miles in the middle of a damned blizzard when you could have done this with a phone call and a few forms?"

"Our boss believes in a hands-on approach. He trusts very few people and trusts bureaucracy less. We do our own legwork," she replied simply. Ziva smoothed out her face and sat back in the booth, crossing her arms over her chest. The two cops spent a couple of minutes studying one another's facial expressions, both looking for any outward signs of untruthfulness.

McCoy was the first to flinch in the unofficial game of chicken. He averted his gaze down to the table top while he twisted his used napkin to death. "Do you Feds really think we're that stupid? I might be nothin' but a local cop, but I didn't fall off the turnip truck yesterday. You know, back home, we have a sayin': if it looks like shit, smells like shit and tastes like shit, then it probably is shit. And this? Has the smell of stink all over the damned place," McCoy insisted.

Ziva leaned in and rested her elbows on the table and looked the sergeant in the eye. His scrutinizing gaze was intense, but after years with Mossad and with Gibbs, she was used to being put under the proverbial microscope. "I understand you are suspicious, and in your position, I would be as well. Trust must be earned, and I know that we have yet not passed your test. But, I am being truthful with you when I tell you that we were sent here to pick up a prisoner, and that we are only here because our team had nothing else to do."

McCoy allowed Ziva's words to digest, taking in the sincerity in her tone and the way she held his eye contact the entire time she said it. It did make sense, and quite honestly, he realized that she and DiNozzo would have been here and gone had the snow storm not derailed their exit plans. Selfishly, there was a little part of his brain that liked the fact she was stuck in Iowa City. Ziva David was a very intriguing woman, and he wouldn't mind getting to know her a little better. Though he loved Jim dearly (even if he was tempted to shoot the younger man from time to time), dinner with Ziva during a lock-in blizzard beat the hell out of trying to make sure Kirk didn't blow anything up because he was bored.

The sergeant softened his expression while he let out a little nod of acceptance. He relaxed his shoulders and sat back in the booth, assuming the non-aggressive position he'd practically melted into earlier while the pair waited for their food. "You sound like you talk from experience."

Ziva noticed the cynical power down from the man sitting across the table. She exhaled an imperceptible sign of relief. "Mmm, I do. But, where I am from, one must be suspicious in order to survive."

McCoy was glad she was finally opening the door for him to pose one of his many burning questions. "And where is that?" he asked, leveling his voice to keep from sounding too eager.

"Israel. I was formerly a member of Mossad," Ziva replied without hesitation.

McCoy's eyebrows ratcheted up to his hairline. "Mossad? As in the special defense forces?"

"The very one."

"Christ, do me a favor and don't ever tell Jim that. The kid is a magnet for trouble, and I don't need him learning he can make a bomb out of Silly Putty and a bullet," McCoy groused while he picked up the water glass pitcher from the side of the table and refilled his glass.

"That is easier than you would think," she answered with a flippant wave of her hand. "What is difficult is making the execution appear as if it were an accident."

McCoy cringed. "I didn't need to hear that," he grumbled under his breath while he shifted in his side of the booth. "Kirk hears 'too easy' and thinks that it's some kind of challenge. He'll take you literally and do it just to prove a point, Ziva. You may have just doomed us all."

Ziva chuckled and looked down, gently picking at the cuticles of her hands. "I would not do that to you, if only to keep your partner from destroying the entire town."

McCoy nodded his head satisfactorily. "Much obliged to you for that, ma'am."

The questions Ziva was itching to pose to her companion about his own path to Iowa were on the tip of her tongue, but the smooth tenor tones of a male voice wafted from McCoy's pocket before she could get the words past her lips. The lyrics might have been muffled, but the expression on McCoy's face was reading loudly and clearly. The NCIS agent tilted her head sideways while he sighed, rolled his eyes and pulled the device from the deep recesses of the coat he'd tossed haphazardly into the booth. Distinctly country, it took Ziva a couple of seconds to place the song that was happily blaring from the phone. "I know that song! It's Some Beach! Abby used to play it when Gibbs…retired. Though, that is a different story entirely which I'm sure you don't wish to hear."

The sergeant put one apologetic finger up while he viciously stabbed at the screen to connect the call. "McCoy!" he barked to the unfortunate soul on the other end.

Ziva tried her best to listen in, but McCoy turned his body to the side, placing the phone toward the wall. He stuck one finger in the ear that wasn't occupied with the conversation and listened intently, brow furrowing as he went. Sighing, David pulled her own phone from her pocket and flipped it open to check it out of force of habit. She grumbled loudly when she saw the trashed screen; the reminder that it was well and truly broken irritated her to no end. Hopefully, McGee would be able to pull her data off it when she got back to D.C.

The sigh of exasperation caught her attention, and Ziva jerked her head up when McCoy's phone hit the table and skidded a couple of inches before coming to a halt when it bounced off the edge of his plate. He ran a couple of frustrated hands over his face while he let out a loud groan. She smirked. "I find your ringtone amusing. I am not much for country music, but I do like that song."

"Yeah," he grumbled while he glared at the screen. "It's fitting for Serdeski."

"Who?" she asked.

"Greg Serdeski. I take it you haven't met him yet."

Ziva shook her head to the contrary. "I have not had the pleasure."

"Oh, there's no pleasure there. He's our desk sergeant, and nothing but a pain in my ass. More than Jim, if that's even possible. When you meet him, you'd be doing us all a favor if you gave into the urge to kill him," McCoy groused.

Ziva raised an eyebrow. "So, that ringtone? I don't understand the significance."

"It's how I feel when I see his number on my phone. I wish I was at some beach every time I hear him."

"Ah. Well, I am certain he had good reason to call you tonight, especially given how busy I he must be. What did he need?" Ziva asked, shifting in the booth to grab her wallet and some cash for the food.

"He said that Pike is finally on his way out his door, so we should think about heading back," McCoy answered while he slid toward the end of the booth. He stood, dropped enough cash on the table to cover both their meals, and motioned for Ziva to precede him out of the restaurant. The two pulled on their coats and pushed open the door, waving to Ribisi on the way out.

Ziva squinted as the blowing wind and snow pricked against her skin. She came to the conclusion that she was with McCoy on the topic of brutal Midwestern weather - why people found winter fun was beyond her comprehension. She fought her way over the giant snow bank left by the plow (which surely was not there when they'd walked over) and stepped on to the street, mindful of the deep ruts left by the plow's blade. Ziva looked back over her shoulder in time to see McCoy nearly trip and fall on the same snow bank, catching himself by using the sign pole to his left as a catch post. She shook her head ruefully and shouted over the roar of the wind, "I think the expression is, 'Out of the frying pan'…"

"…And into the fire'." McCoy answered in a half yell while he pulled out his gloves and cinched up the hood on his coat. He let his eyes roam to the looming shape of the Iowa City PD station, wondering how long it was going to take them to fight their way back. The sergeant put his head down and started walking, cursing the storm to the depths of hell as he went. Among the various incendiary thoughts running through his head, the one that McCoy kept coming back to was that whatever Pike needed, it damned well better be _important_.

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><p><strong>Next Up<strong>: Kirk breaks, DiNozzo enters, and Pike turns red. Literally.


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's Notes**: Christmas shopping is driving me crazy, so I'm ignoring it in favor of posting this story while I watch the Drew Brees and the Saints annihilate the Vikings. (Dude, seriously. I'm a fair weather football fan, but a die-hard hockey fan, so go Wild!) In the interim, here's a little chapter of craziness after all that was Ziva and Bones' very nice, relaxing (and surprisingly intimate) dinner. Leave it to Kirk and DiNozzo to interrupt the moment. As always, comments are loved, but never required. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer**: I don't own NCIS or Star Trek, or anything else that you might recognize in this story. I own only the ideas in it, and a very overactive imagination.

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><p><strong>Chapter 6<strong>

_Iowa City, Iowa_

Early on in their partnership, one of the things Jim discovered about McCoy was that the man was hellbent on spending a good portion of his adult life perfecting the fine art of accusation. Specifically, he would often indict Kirk on charges of 'being' things. Being obstinate, being helpful, being annoying, being loyal, being an infant, being wrong, being right. (Although, according to McCoy, the ratio of wrong to right was about a billion to one.) But, there was one thing of which Bones _never_ accused Kirk: being smart.

Really, the whole world knew the sergeant was referring to all matters figurative every time he called his partner a dumbass. Jim literally had enough book smarts to embarrass half the PhDs on the planet while only using half his functioning brain cells. No, McCoy was referring to Kirk's penchant for leaping before he looked, that instinctual gift Pike both loved and loathed. As hard as the older man tried, it was the one thing that still really hadn't improved, even after the years under Bones' expert tutelage.

If McCoy's best efforts simply reigned in Kirk's do-or-die nature to a manageable (and non-lethal) level, the sudden appearance of Anthony 'Big-D-Little-I-Big-N-Little-Ozzo' sure as hell wasn't going to help matters. When Bones told him he was out on a mission for food that wasn't divided up by a spirally piece of metal that, "Always ate his damned money anyway," and was therefore going out somewhere, Kirk read the message of caution dancing all over his partner's face loudly and clearly. Subsequently, he and DiNozzo promised to behave like good little children, and for the most part, they did. But, there was only so much Operation and Battleship two grown men could play before boredom invariably set in, and when it did, the pair went looking for…alternatives.

If the prospect of a budding friendship between one federal agent and one Iowa City cop wasn't so frightening, the mirror image poses Kirk and DiNozzo sported standing outside Scotty's office might have actually been amusing. Jim tipped his head to the side while he contemplated their next move. "How do you want to play this?"

"I'm all about the direct approach."

"Awesome," Jim replied. "So, I'm gonna break, and you're gonna enter."

Tony put his arm out to stop Kirk as he advanced on the door. Shaking his head, he insisted, "Oh, no, no, no. I am not going to let you have all the fun. Stand back and let the master do his work, Kirk."

"You think I can't pick a lock? I'll have you know I was a very misguided youth, and I'm proud of it. I learned a thing or two about getting past deterrents like that," Kirk insisted while he pulled out the knife he always carried from his pocket. He flicked the auto-lock mechanism with his thumb, and the blade sprung clear from its sheath. Jim inserted the metal tip into the keyhole and gave a little wiggle while he lifted the door handle upward. With a light 'click', the lock snapped back, allowing the pair access to their prize.

Tony pulled his wrist down from in front of his face and gave an approving nod. "Two and a half seconds? Not bad, Kirk. Not bad." DiNozzo followed Jim through the threshold of the door and into the darkened room. In the basement of the building and just off the garage, the area was a little musty and damp, even for the time of year. The smell of engine oil and abrasive chemicals permeated the room; it was almost impossible to miss. There was only one small window in the far corner, which offered little in the way of light. He lost sight of Kirk, but he could hear the other man navigating through the dark across the space. "Done this before, I take it?" Tony called.

Kirk reached the light switches on the other side of the room and flicked the yellow toggle up. The hum of fluorescent lights buzzed in DiNozzo's ears a second before his eyes were assaulted by the bright glow from the ceiling. Jim laughed while Tony squinted away, moving toward some furniture on the left side of what turned out to be a very unconventional office. "A time or two, yeah."

With his pupils dilated to a more appropriate level, DiNozzo took a quick moment to observe his surroundings. The room was large, probably the size of a very generous two-car garage. A workbench sat against the far wall, right below where Kirk had to go to turn on the lights. DiNozzo's eyebrows climbed to his hairline when he saw what was in the middle of the room, and he was simultaneously glad he'd had the foresight to stay put. A mechanic's pit personified by the large, gaping hole in the floor that was surrounded by yellow and black stripes took up a large section of half the office. About five feet from the workbench against the wall, it butted up nearly to the bare concrete support beam that was probably holding up half the building. The fact Kirk didn't fall into the thing and break his neck while he moved stealthy across the room in the dark spoke volumes about his familiarity with the placement of the obstacles and the layout.

On the other side of the room, DiNozzo's eyes followed Jim over to the area where the most unique set of living room furniture resided. There was a couch and two chairs, but the pieces were definitely far from ordinary. The couch was made up of a grey, leather-like material, though it was much smaller than a normal couch. Two generously sized indentations were pressed into the leather with a third, albeit smaller space, stuffed almost as an afterthought in between. Tony studied it further and he realized the reason it looked so completely odd was because it was a damned bench seat from the back of a car. If the headrests bobbing on top of the back of the couch didn't give it away, the item's two feet of elevation off the ground on a custom pedestal most certainly did. Rounding out the look were two sweeping grey armrests that made twin crescents on each side, forming the ends of the couch. A cursory look at the other two chairs confirmed that they were also made from what appeared to be the front seats, and in the same fashion as the couch.

The coffee table was probably the central piece, though. As DiNozzo walked closer, he got a good look at what originally looked like a metal table with a glass top. But, on second glance, he realized that the rectangle shaped glass was floating on top of an engine block from a Ford V8. Polished to a high, nickel-bright shine, all the wires and plugs had been removed and the pistons that fired up through the housing were absent as well. Still, there was no mistaking the space the eight cylinders would have used, nor could he miss the distinctive presses and shapes of the engine itself. DiNozzo couldn't help but let out a little chuckle. It was, in a word, brilliant.

With a shake of his head, he walked around the back of the furniture to join his new companion. He paused momentarily when, on the back side of the couch, Tony's eyes zeroed in on a mangled, deformed Iowa license plate. He was able to make out a 'P', an 'L' and an 'I', but nothing else through the scrap of twisted metal. He let out a low whistle when, on his final walk-around, Tony saw the edge of the engine block coffee table. The engine was smashed in on one corner, and a very impressive crack ran through the area that would have held the first cylinder. DiNozzo made a mental note to try and pry the story of the one-of-a-kind furniture out of someone from the department before he asked, "So whose office are we invading now?"

"Scotty's. He's the mechanic around here, and he won't care," Jim replied, reaching into the mini fridge. He pulled out a few cans of Mountain Dew and snagged some Cheetos from the top of the appliance before he ambled over to the space and plopped down.

"There's a lock on the door he actually uses, unlike some people I know. That implies that he might care," Tony said with a raised eyebrow while he accepted the snacks from Jim.

"That's for everyone else, not me. He gave me a key once, but when he figured out that I still picked the lock, he made me give it back. Scotty told me that he doesn't care what I do, just as long as I don't eat all the snacks and I lock the door on my way out," Kirk answered while he dug one greedy hand into the Cheetos.

"Okay, that's officially awesome," Tony admitted, wondering silently just how terrible of a death Abby might devise if he were stupid enough to do the same thing to the door of her lab.

"Yeah, I thought so, too. It's a righteous deal. In return, all I had to do was teach him how to shoot." Jim lifted up his butt and fished underneath the vicinity of his seat. He cursed loudly, feeling around until his fingers hit paydirt. He coaxed the plastic device from the recesses of the couch and hit the 'power' button on his prize – the remote for Scotty's flatscreen TV. As the screen warmed up, an orgasmically sated look washed over his face while he flipped the channel, landing on what looked like a hockey game. "Thank God. I thought I missed it."

DiNozzo coughed into his hand. "We broke into your mechanic's office so we could watch a hockey game? You know, when you mentioned a change of venue, this is not exactly what I had in mind."

"Please tell me you didn't call the world's most awesome sport _just_ a hockey game. I was starting to like you, but if you're nothing but another hater…" Jim replied, trailing off before he could finish the thought.

"It's not that I don't like it. I just don't get it. At all," Tony replied quickly.

Kirk's face lit up. "Oh. Well, I can fix that!"

From the doorway, McCoy's sharp, authoritative voice cut into the conversation. "Just do yourself a favor, DiNozzo: if he offers to teach you to ice skate, tell him no."

Tony covered his momentary shock by schooling his face before he placed his hand dramatically over his heart. He swiveled in his seat and turned his head toward the door to see their respective partners, back from dinner and full of snow. In a very dramatic voice, DiNozzo told the Iowa City sergeant, "Aww. And here I didn't think you cared, McCoy!"

McCoy rolled his eyes, pushed his body off the frame of the door where he was leaning and sauntered into the room. He made a 'shooing' motion with one hand and dropped into the remaining space on the couch next to Kirk a millisecond after his partner moved. Reaching for the Cheetos, he shot Jim a baneful look. "I don't. But, I still have to ride in a car with him," McCoy said, jerking his thumb toward Kirk while he bounced some of the cheesy snacks around in his palm. "And what I don't need is to have to listen to him gloat all day long that he did the same thing to you as he did to me."

"I did _not_ make you fall on your ass, Bones. That was all you and your Bambi coordination."

"There is a reason humans are land creatures. Man should not be able to walk on water. It's just not natural," the sergeant complained loudly as he glared daggers at his partner.

Kirk grinned widely right before he clapped McCoy on the back. "You're just pissed you were sore for a week afterwards. Stop frontin', old man."

"No, I'm pissed I let you talk me into that nonsense in the first place," McCoy retorted while he tried and failed to grab one of the unopened Mountain Dew cans Kirk lined up on the coffee table. He glared at his partner when the younger man used his body to shield the sergeant from the caffeine. "Jim, gimme. I'm not going to tell you again."

"More?" came Ziva's incredulous voice. "After all the food you ate tonight, I am surprised there is still room in your stomach."

McCoy picked that moment to turn bright red as he sputtered unintelligently at his dinner partner's well-placed, well-timed comment. Grumbling, he muttered, "Dammit, Ziva. I didn't eat that much," loudly enough for the room's occupants to hear it in lieu of an actual, thoughtful response.

She snorted out loud while she dropped gracefully into the other single chair. Crossing one leg over the other, the former Mossad officer waved a hand about the air and said, "You inhaled your food! I doubt you even tasted what it was."

"It was veal," McCoy ground out while he sunk deeper into the couch. "And I was hungry. I told you that."

Ziva lifted her eyebrows and smirked, causing Tony to stifle a laugh. He knew that look, and he was thankful that it, for once, wasn't directed at him.

The room fell into a companionable silence. McCoy shifted and cleared his throat as he looked for a way to divert attention from himself and on to someone else where it rightly belonged. Glancing up at the screen, he asked Tony, "You're willingly watching hockey with him?"

DiNozzo shrugged. "Why not? It was this or we tried to build a better mousetrap."

McCoy shuddered involuntarily at the thought of Jim's overly curious hands and hyperactive brain building anything. Knowing Kirk, it would end up overdone, way too big, and with the propensity to explode. "Oh dear God, please no."

"Come on, McCoy. How bad can it really be?"

"You don't know Jim," was the sergeant's flat, icy reply. "_Nothing_ he ever does goes to plan."

"Kind of like your life, Bones," Kirk chimed in from across the room.

"We're not going to talk about that," McCoy groused while his lip curled into a fairly impressive sneer. "But we are going to talk about the two of you not building anything, especially while I'm trapped in the same building with you."

Tony made a show and put on his best pouty face before he said, "What we're doing right now is pretty harmless, I think. There's nothing wrong with watching a sport with my new friend here. It's the ultimate bonding experience."

McCoy dropped his face into his hands while Ziva let out a little huff. "That's exactly what I'm worried about. You two. Bonding. Something bad will come from it. I can feel it."

DiNozzo turned to Kirk, the latter of whom still had his eyes glued on the television. "He really is a buzzkill, man. You weren't kidding."

"You get why I had him listed as 'Ye of Little Faith' in my phone for a month now, don't you?"

"'Ye of Little Faith', Jim? I have plenty of faith, but I tend to keep it rooted in reality," McCoy hissed out, not liking the sudden turn of the conversation toward himself. "This is all going to blow up spectacularly, and I hope I'm far enough away not to get hit with the shit when it hits the fan."

Ziva crinkled up her nose. "That would extraordinarily disgusting."

"It's Jim. Disgusting is his middle name. I put nothing past him," McCoy said with a loud snort.

"Look," DiNozzo started. "All the drama and the fact that you don't like me aside, why is it so terrible that Kirk and I hang out tonight? We played nice while you two adults were doing…whatever it is you were doing. Grown up stuff."

Kirk snickered while his mind clearly took a nose dive for the gutter. He glanced over at DiNozzo, the latter of whom looked positively smug with his not-so-faux pas. "Yeah, Bones. You got to hang out with Ziva. What's wrong with me getting to know DiNozzo here?"

"It's not like we're building a potato bazooka and shooting it off the roof of the station. You know, right above the chief's brand new car," Tony chimed in, grinning while he watched the tips of McCoy's ears and nose redden slightly. Somehow, the NCIS agent managed to keep a straight face when continued with, "I just told Kirk that I don't know a thing about hockey, and he said he'd teach me. He's been really calm about it all, so I have no idea why you're worried-"

The sentence wasn't even clear of DiNozzo's mouth when Kirk, who apparently possessed the ability to both participate in a conversation and watch a hockey game at the same time, hollered, "_SHOOT! SHOOT THE DAMN PUCK!_" while pumping his fists emphatically. He sprang from his seat on the bench-couch when, on the TV, he saw one of the defensemen slide the puck over to the opposite side, near the top of the circle painted on the playing surface. Without catching the pass, the defensive partner raised his stick off the ice and one-timed a slap shot that was gloved by easily the opposing goalie. Kirk's hands flew to the top of his head and he collapsed back into his chair, groaning as the linesmen raced in to break up the scrum that spontaneously broke out in front of the goalmouth. "Augh! We have to get some traffic in front of that net! It's too easy for him! He saw it way too cleanly."

McCoy looked over at Ziva. The woman was doing her best not to laugh at Kirk's outburst, and failing miserably. The sergeant let his gaze pass the former Mossad officer and wander over to Tony, whose expression clearly stated 'troubled' in big, neon letters. McCoy snagged another handful of Cheetos before he asked smugly, "You were saying, Agent DiNozzo?"

"I feel like I've fallen into _Slapshot_. Where's Reggie Dunlop when you need him?" Tony mumbled under his breath.

"_Slapshot_ is not a myth. It's awesome, like Denis Lemieux explaining penalties, even if he got most of them wrong," Kirk amended without looking away from the screen. Jim watched as the team in white passed the puck from near the faceoff dots of their defensive end to a player streaking down the far wing in the neutral zone. The speedy forward caught it mid stride and was on his way across the blue line when the linesman's whistle blew. "Noo! What are you doing, you idiot? Stay on side! DIDN'T THEY TEACH YOU ABOUT SKATE CONTACT IN SQUIRTS?"

Ziva picked up a motoring magazine sitting on the table and began to thumb through it. Distractedly, she said with a shake of her head, "Men and sports: the love that dare not speak its name. I will never understand it."

"That's probably for the best, since you made ping-pong a full contact sport." Tony said off-handedly to his partner. At the same time, he was beginning to wonder if McCoy was right about one thing: Kirk really _might_ be crazy. He blinked through the total shock of Jim's nearly instantaneous transition from the laid back, fun loving and easy going cop to a screaming, frothing, swearing, rabid hockey fan. It was both scary and amusing all at once, though DiNozzo wasn't sure in what order those two events occurred. He let his eyes drift over to Kirk's seething face and held the gaze there while he observed the young man. Pointing at the screen, he said, "You do realize they can't hear you, right?"

Kirk felt the side eye on his face from the other side of the room before he actually heard DiNozzo speak. He snapped his head toward Tony and, "Of course I know that. But yelling makes me feel better. And stop looking at me like that!"

"Like what?"

Jim glared. "Like you think I'm ready for the funny farm! I'm not crazy! Crazy is Bones watching football."

McCoy cleared his throat loudly. "Jim, do you always have to drag me into all your shit? Wait. Don't answer that." To DiNozzo, the sergeant straightened as best he could and added, "I'm not crazy. I'm intense. There's a difference."

A hearty laugh bubbled from the dark haired woman in the chair next to Tony. She tossed the magazine back on the table and said, "If there is a difference, I do not wish to see it. I, for one, think you are _all_ crazy!"

"Pot calling the kettle black much, huh Ziva?" DiNozzo asked. "This is coming from a woman who thinks relaxation is an advanced hand to hand refresher."

"Tony, a hand to hand refresher is practical. Obsession with a mere game is not. Fanaticism is completely illogical and a waste of time."

McCoy narrowed his eyes and crossed his muscled arms over his broad chest. Suspiciously, he asked, "Lady, you don't happen to be related to a guy named Spock, do you?"

"It is possible I could have a relative somewhere out there I have not met. My father was not the most truthful man," Ziva admitted, her dark eyes flicking down and toward her feet.

McCoy laughed lightly. The sound was low and surprisingly warm, and he suddenly felt self-conscious when he realized it caught his dinner partner off guard. Smirking from the corner of his mouth, he admitted, "That was rhetorical, Ziva."

"Ah. I wasn't sure if that was indeed your intent."

The sergeant nodded his head while Ziva went back to perusing the magazine selection on Scotty's coffee table. As much as he'd like to get to know more about the NCIS agent, he knew he couldn't afford such a luxury, at least not until backup arrived. Out of the corner of his eye, McCoy saw Kirk and DiNozzo whispering conspiratorially to each other while they looked nervously about their surroundings. "And just what are you two children planning now?" he asked in his best condescending sergeant's voice.

"World domination," was Kirk's smart-assed, cheeky reply.

McCoy replied by simply huffing and muttering out something obscene that ended in a vague threat against Jim's ability to procreate.

"We were talking about factual stuff, Bones," Kirk started by way of explanation while his partner simultaneously opened his mouth to offer his standard protest.

"You know what? He's telling you the truth," DiNozzo cut in, effectively silencing the sergeant. "See, we're actually discussing the office paper airplane records. I have our record, and Jim here told me that he has yours. We have plenty of paper, the will to do it, and a very big, empty garage. So you know what that means?"

On the couch, Jim was positively beaming. "We're playing for bragging rights, Bones. It's in the rulebook somewhere that when challenged, we're supposed to uphold the integrity of the department. Or something."

A sigh seemed so terribly inadequate to fully express his outright reluctance to even acknowledge the pair's existence, so he settled on a healthy serving of sarcasm instead. "Right. Because God forbid you'd turn down an opportunity to give me a damned migraine, Jim." McCoy lifted his body up off the couch, grabbed the can of Mountain Dew he was drinking and guzzled the contents. He crushed the green aluminum with one hand before he tossed the remnants into the garbage on the other side of the table.

Kirk ducked his head and hopped to his feet. He hooked his thumbs into the belt loops of his low-slung, dark blue jeans and replied, "They're paper airplanes. I mean, how bad can it be?"

McCoy reached up and pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger. "How many times have I heard that, right before something goes wrong?"

"You are so melodramatic. It never goes wrong, but it sometimes just doesn't go according to plan," Jim laughed out in response as he ran one hand through his sandy blonde hair. "I know you think I'm crazy, but once – just once – it would be cool if you'd recognize my awesomeness. You just gotta go with the flow, man."

"Jim, we tried that, and it ended with one very pissed off chief and an IA investigation. Remember? The indignity of being locked in interrogation with Spock is something I will never repeat," McCoy hissed out with a shudder while his right eyebrow scaled his forehead.

"Why can't you see it as a challenge, Bones? Besides, I covered for you."

McCoy pursed his lips until they flattened out into a grim, straight line. "I know," he muttered almost gratefully. Just as quickly, the appreciative expression disappeared as the sergeant's eyes slid over toward DiNozzo, who wasn't even trying to contain the snorts of glee coming from his mouth. As his face soured further, McCoy slowly turned his head and fixed the NCIS agent with the most intense, withering glare he could muster. It had the desired effect on DiNozzo's mouth, but it was of little comfort when he thought about _why,_ exactly, Tony was laughing. Straightening, McCoy brushed past the two younger men and proclaimed, "You two infants can do whatever you'd like. I just hope Pike comes to get me so I can watch him kick your asses when gets here."

Kirk snorted and looked over toward DiNozzo. "Yep. Ye of Little Faith," Jim said with a huge, annoying grin on his face.

Ziva held up one hand and hopped up out of the chair as McCoy walked past. "I think I will join you. Tony, if you destroy anything here, you will be taking the blame."

DiNozzo flashed Ziva one of his trademark get-out-of-jail free smiles. "I would never dream of it, partner! I'm a big boy! I can handle it!"

"That is _precisely_ what I'm worried about," she replied, her voice already echoing as she walked down the long, empty hallway that led to the stairs and up to the operations center of the station. She fell into stride with McCoy as the pair disappeared up the steps.

Kirk narrowed his eyes and smirked slyly. Pointing to their partners' retreating backs, he looked over towards Tony and asked, "Did you just see what I saw there?"

"Our partners shamelessly flirting with each other? Because if that's what you're going to ask, my answer is yes," DiNozzo replied.

"It would probably be smart for us to be afraid after seeing that, don't you think?" Kirk mused out loud.

"Yeah," DiNozzo agreed while he raised an eyebrow. "It would be smart, wouldn't it?"

"But are you?"

"Afraid? Not at all," Tony answered emphatically.

Jim's fingers wandered over toward Scotty's workbench. He picked up a socket wrench and spun it around in his hand. The ratcheting of the tool clicked in his ear when he harrumphed out loud and said, "Hmm. Me, neither."

Tony crossed his arms over his chest while he tipped his head to the side. He brought one hand up and tapped his lips with his index finger. As if he was thinking about a lead on a big case, he asked, "Do you think we should we be scared?"

"Probably."

"But we're not that smart," the NCIS agent concluded aloud.

A slow, mischievous grin broke out across Jim's face. "Nope. We're not."

"Well, at least I'm in good company," DiNozzo proclaimed as he wiggled a piece of paper out from underneath a box of overflowing and random car parts. Tony contemplated the design of the airplane; as a civilian employee of the United States Navy, he knew that Gibbs would kick his ass from the Navy Yard to Quantico and back again if he returned to D.C. reporting that he lost in a paper airplane contest to a local LEO. He could even hear Gibbs' voice in his head. '_The Navy has jets and you lived on an aircraft carrier, DiNozzo. You had an advantage_.' It didn't matter that he'd never actually been at the stick of one of those jets. Even so, Gibbs wouldn't tolerate the excuse.

With his boss' motivational words completely ensconced in the back of his mind, DiNozzo set to work. He folded, measured, creased and balanced. Nearly finished, Tony was inspecting his handiwork when he realized one edge was just a little off. He started looking around the organized entropy that was Scotty's workbench for something flat and weighty, perhaps a ruler or a file to fix the raw edge. He tossed aside a few random curved wrenches that were far too large for such a delicate project and opened the drawer that was hovering above his legs.

There was so much random crap jammed in every possible place, DiNozzo wasn't sure how the mechanic found anything. As much as the rigidity of the Navy sometimes baffled him, Tony was beginning to understand the method to the madness when it came to the military's insane organizational tendencies. Shoving aside a bottle of vitamins and what looked like a package of Ho-Hos (smashed nearly beyond recognition), DiNozzo's fingers closed on an incredibly fat, shiny and weighty silver pen. He flipped it over a few times in his hand and, impressed with the craftsmanship, used it to fix the crease of the plane.

DiNozzo looked across the room to see Kirk working diligently away as he finished up his project. Jim's tongue was poking out of the corner of his mouth while he concentrated on the design. Picking up his entry, DiNozzo pocketed the pen and sauntered over toward Kirk. He plopped down in the chair next to the Iowa City cop and asked, "Ready to get your ass handed to you yet?"

"I just have to finish one thing here, and then I'll be able to show you how we do it Iowa," Jim fired back. Trash talking was his specialty, and Kirk would be damned if he'd allow a fed to show him up. He brushed off some of the residual Cheeto powder from his fingers and grumbled when he noticed an orange streak on one of the corners of his plane. Shrugging, Jim stood and walked with DiNozzo out the door of the office and into the underground garage. He led the NCIS agent over toward the side of the massive structure, away from the small army of squad cars and toward a recessed, fenced-off area.

Tony laughed when he looked down at the floor running parallel to the long line of chain link fence storage. Marked in white electrical tape were measurements, set in increments of five feet a crack, from zero all the way down to one hundred at the other end of the garage. DiNozzo pointed. "Your chief lets you keep that on the floor? Man, my old boss in Baltimore would have killed us, never mind what Gibbs might do."

"Honestly?" Jim answered. "We've never asked. The guys that are involved in this contest figured it's easier to grovel for forgiveness than it'd be to ask for permission. Barnett would have said no anyway, so why bother?"

"But he has to know about it," DiNozzo hypothesized out loud.

Kirk nodded emphatically as he looked down range. Formulating a strategy in his head, he answered DiNozzo with, "I know he does, but I think he figures if this keeps us occupied, he won't complain. If he outlawed this, we'd just come up with something different."

A flash of headlights and the rumble of an engine interrupted the compliment Tony was about to give. Kirk had balls - that much was certain, and he'd earned DiNozzo's respect. He let the thought roll around in his head as Tony watched a dark SUV, caked liberally with snow, pulled through the door of the station's garage and into one of the open parking spaces. The engine cut, the door opened, and the driver stepped out.

Over his head, Jim waved the new arrival over. From a distance, Tony was able to file away some basic data. About the same height as Jim and McCoy, the new man was visibly older, though the spring in his step belied the grey collected at his temples and sprinkled throughout his otherwise light brown hair. He was dressed similarly to Kirk – very casually in a grey sweater and a pair of jeans, but his garb did absolutely nothing to hide the authority that radiated off him in waves. It was only because of the years on Gibbs' team that Tony was able to repress the instinctual need to step back as a set of ice blue eyes bored into him as the older man studied the NCIS agent. 'Refined' was probably the best word DiNozzo could come up with as the man drew closer, ignoring him completely in favor of Jim.

Kirk stuck his hand out and greeted the stranger warmly. "Lieu," the younger man said.

"Kirk," he answered, nodding while he gave Jim's hand an emphatic pump.

Jim turned to face DiNozzo and pointed toward the new stranger. "Tony DiNozzo, this is Lieutenant Chris Pike. Lieu, Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo, NCIS."

Pike arched one eyebrow while his gaze flicked down to the badge clipped to Tony's belt. A deep, powerful but strangely soothing voice emanated from his chest when the lieutenant answered, "NCIS, huh? God, that makes me feel old."

DiNozzo tilted his head to the side while he thought about Pike's words. He took into account the ramrod straight posture, the natural born leadership vibe, and the military bearing. Snapping his fingers, he said, "You served when it was NIS I'll bet."

"Very good," Chris answered, clearly impressed. "I never had any need for you guys back when I was in the Corps, but I'm glad to know that the Navy doesn't hire idiots to investigate their crimes." Pike shook his head and extended his right hand to DiNozzo. "I'm sorry, it's been a long night already. Chris Pike."

"Tony DiNozzo. Nice to meet you. I wish I could say I'm enjoying your city, but that'd just be a load of bullshit. I'm not. This is horrible," Tony admitted. He tilted his head to the side as a couple more pieces slid into place. "Let me guess: two tours with the Corps, which I'd also bet makes you McCoy's old partner, right?"

"You'd be right," Pike said. He motioned for the pair to follow as he slowly ambled toward the door to Scotty's lair.

"I'm sorry," DiNozzo quipped before he could hold it back.

"Why?" Pike asked, stopping in mid stride. Sharply, he asked, "That I served? Because let me tell you, son. I have never and will never regret my time with the Marines."

Eyes wide, Tony held up both hands and spit out in a rush, "No, no, that's what I meant at all. I work for NCIS. I have respect for the military."

Pike narrowed his eyes suspiciously in Tony's direction. "Then what were you talking about, Agent DiNozzo?"

"I was actually talking about your former partner." Tony coughed uncomfortably, cursing himself for the thousandth time for letting his mouth get ahead of his brain. He scoffed a couple of times while his eyes darted around the grey walls of the garage, clarifying his previous statement with, "You know, because he isn't exactly the nicest guy in the world. I'll bet your conversations during patrol were fun to non-existent."

To DiNozzo's shocked surprise, Pike waved his hand and laughed. "Len's not that bad. He just has to warm up to you, that's all."

"How long did that take?" DiNozzo asked.

"Oh, a few months," he replied, purposely vague. He slowed his stride and pointed his index finger toward Tony. "Whatever you think of him now, just know that he's a good man, and a better cop. I trust him."

Tony wordlessly nodded before he fell back in step with Kirk and Pike.

The lieutenant stopped in front of the door that led out of the garage and into the station proper, pulling a folded up piece of paper from his pocket. He flipped it open, and, addressing Jim, told him, "Kirk, I forgot to sign off on your last few hours of overtime when you turned in your time card, and I want to make sure you get paid. Chapel said she wasn't going to do it without my signature." He patted down his pockets and sighed. "Anyone have a pen?"

DiNozzo reached into the pocket of his pants and pulled out the pen he'd borrowed from Scotty's workbench earlier in the evening. He extended his arm and handed it to Pike. "Yeah, here. Use this."

Pike clicked the plunger three times and flipped the writing device over in his hand. At the same time, he leaned up against the door to Scotty's office and unfurled Jim's overtime request. Plastering the paper against the metal, he was just about to start the flourish of the 'C' in his first name when the top of the silver tube unexpectedly blew off. It bounced off the lieutenant's neck and clattered to the floor. Pike opened his mouth and managed a surprised grunt a second before bright red foam started spewing from the end of the pen he was holding.

It was akin to opening a joke can, the one with the spring form snake hiding inside it. The foam propelled itself from the pen at a volume that shouldn't have been possible from such a small source. It hit the lieutenant in the face, cascaded down his neck and soaked completely through the grey knit sweater he was wearing. What didn't hit his face, shirt or pants dripped off Pike and landed with a splat on the floor below. Pike turned, mouth agape as he tried to wipe off the blood red dye from his face. His expression aghast, the lieutenant tried to clear the substance from his eyes and spit out what managed to invade his mouth.

"GODDAMMIT! WHAT THE SHIT IS GOING ON HERE?" the lieutenant yelled. The sound bounced off the walls of the garage and sent all the little mice (or scared police officers) scurrying for cover. The only remaining souls left were Kirk and DiNozzo, both frozen in place by dumbstruck shock.

Tony never thought that it would have been possible for someone who looked like a red Oompa Loompa to be so intimidating, but Chris Pike was making it happen quite sufficiently. The older man's eyes bulged from his head and his lips curled into the meanest, most impressive scowl DiNozzo had ever seen. The crimson stain to his skin against the color of his eyes made him look that much more maniacal, never mind the fact that he was fucking _pissed_. The NCIS agent looked over toward his Iowa City companion, and from the corner of his eyes, saw the Kirk was just as dumbfounded as he was. "I'm guessing there was a reason that pen was buried in the bottom of that drawer, huh?" DiNozzo asked, cringing through the entire sentence as he stood stock still next to Kirk.

Jim's face was pinched up into an equally pained expression. "If it was that big silver one, yeah. There was a reason."

"We are so dead," Tony breathed out while his posture deflated.

Jim chewed nervously on the inside of his lip as he watched his lieutenant swear and curse at the dye coating him from head to toe. "Yep."

* * *

><p><strong>Next Up<strong>: Ziva and McCoy attempt to eavesdrop on Pike's "conversation" with Kirk and DiNozzo, and IA gets involved.


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Notes**: All right all, I've got good news and I've got bad news. The good news is that I have only two chapters left to post after this one to finish uploading the story. The bad news is the father-in-law is back in the hospital, which means that updates on this story are probably going to be sporadic at best. (I'm actually posting this from the waiting room just adjacent to the ICU - joy.) I will do my best to get this up sooner rather than later, but I can make no promises at this point. In any case, I hope you all enjoy it! Comments are loved (especially after the month we've had), always returned, but certainly never required. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer**: If I owned Star Trek or NCIS, I wouldn't probably be worrying about how much my father-in-law's medical bills are going to cost. Seriously.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 7<strong>

_Iowa City, Iowa_

"Can you see anything?" McCoy grunted as he bent his knees, adjusting to the precious cargo teetering precariously above his head. He moved his neck a fraction of a second before the heel of Ziva's boot swept past his face. "And dammit, woman! Watch your feet! Hearing this conversation is not worth a broken nose!"

From her perch on top of McCoy's shoulders, Ziva replied, "Well, if you would stop scuttling your feet down there, I wouldn't have to make the adjustments up here! Just stand still!"

"I'm trying, but you keep moving!" he hissed. "And it's 'shuffle', not 'scuttle'. I would shuffle my feet, but scuttle a submarine."

"Right, fine. It is of very little difference right now, because I cannot hear anything over the sound of your incessant whining!" the former Mossad officer shot back at her counterpart. "This was your idea, so if you do not like it, blame yourself!"

McCoy sighed and resolved to concede defeat on that front. He knew he should have left well enough alone when he saw Pike storm up the stairs, dyed red and positively fuming, but he just had to keep poking the hornet's nest. Perhaps Kirk was rubbing off on him, because the sergeant really did want to know how angry his former partner was, and how dead his current partner was about to be.

When McCoy told Jim that he hoped Pike would come get him before kicking the younger man's ass, he meant it in gest. Now, it looked like it just might happen for real. The sergeant watched, amused, as two very contrite law enforcement professionals followed the irate lieutenant through the station. Like a set of lambs heading to slaughter, both men's heads were bowed, figurative tails tucked firmly between their legs as they headed into the wolf's lair. Pike ushered Kirk and DiNozzo wordlessly inside his office before slamming the door hard enough to rattle the building's foundation.

…And that brought him to his current conundrum. What seemed like a great idea at the time was turning quickly into a clusterfuck of a proposition. The moment Ziva and McCoy, both trying to look aloof, saw the lieutenant's office door shut, prop magazines and books scattered in every direction. The pair scrambled to their feet as they tried to devise a way to listen in on the conversation. The sergeant, well-versed in the station's layout, suggested they eavesdrop over the air duct that ran through the wall right above Chris' desk. Ziva eagerly agreed, even if it meant invading the men's bathroom to do it.

They hadn't thought bring a ladder, and by the time the two cops went downstairs to Scotty's office to find one, both were convinced they would have missed the fireworks. Instead, McCoy simply rolled his eyes and squatted down, motioning for Ziva to hop on his shoulders. He positioned himself under the vent, hefted the woman up and braced his stance while she gracefully climbed to her feet. Balancing on his shoulders, Ziva called out little adjustments until her face was pressed right up against the vent with a perfect view of the conversation. The sergeant grabbed her ankles to keep her steady while Ziva laid the palms of her hands flat against the ugly beige walls. Exhaling that it actually went to plan, McCoy waited for the NCIS agent's report.

"Do not move. I can see them now!" she instructed. "Your lieutenant is attempting to wipe off the substance on his face, and is having very little luck."

"I can imagine. I think I know what just hit Pike, and if I'm right, it won't come off for days. Scotty doesn't do anything halfway. Remind me to tell you the story about the car sauna sometime," McCoy replied honestly.

"Car sauna? I'm not sure I want to know."

"Well, after this, what Pike did to us will look absolutely sedate," McCoy told Ziva. He shrugged out of force of habit before he remembered another person was balancing on his shoulders. The sudden movement jostled the NCIS agent, and she dug her heels into the sensitive recesses of his collarbone to steady herself. Hissing in pain, McCoy shot an angry, "Hey, watch it!" up to his cohort.

"I told you to stop moving! I could have fallen, and then we would both be in your lieutenant's office with our partners. Would that be preferable?" she asked, looking down at McCoy and waving her hand around. She laid the appendage on her hip while she tilted her head to the side, shooting a glare at the sergeant. When he didn't reply, she added, "I didn't think so."

McCoy grumbled and took a deep, calming breath. "What are you seeing?"

Ziva repositioned herself in front of the slatted vent. "Lieutenant Pike is examining a pen. I assume it is the delivery vessel – the end is bright red."

"Big silver one?"

"Yes," she answered.

McCoy nodded in understanding right before he sighed. "Yep. That's Scotty's. Got it in his head one day after watching _Goldeneye_ that he should try and be Q. I told him he wasn't allowed to make a pen that exploded, so he settled on one that spewed red foam everywhere."

"I have actually seen this movie!" Ziva exclaimed in a hushed whisper. "Tony is quite fond of James Bond, and he has insisted that I watch them all. The pen in this instance exploded after it is clicked three times, with a ten-second delay, yes?"

"It was a four second fuse," McCoy corrected.

"Right, yes. Four seconds. I remember now," Ziva said with a nod. Pursing her lips, she added, "Though at this point, I don't think it matters how long the fuse for the pen was. It appears your lieutenant's fuse is growing quite short."

"I'm surprised he's lasted this long. Pike's patient, but he doesn't put up with bullshit."

"Sounds like Gibbs. Oh! He is making a phone call!" she exclaimed from her perch. She stopped and quieted herself as she listened. "He is calling a teammate of mine, Tim McGee. And he is yelling. Loudly."

"I actually can hear that all the way down here," McCoy said. "I think the last anyone got bitched at this badly by the shift lieutenant was when it was my ass in one of those chairs, right next to Pike, when he was still a sergeant."

Ziva cocked an eyebrow up, even though she knew McCoy couldn't see it. "Oh, so you are not the perfect patrol officer after all?"

He snorted. "Never said I was, just that I'm more responsible than my infant partner in there."

"I doubt that is very hard," Ziva replied.

"No, it isn't. All you need to be better behaved than Jim is something called common sense. He lacks it." McCoy flexed his shoulders and winced. "Ziva, your boot heel is digging into my shoulder and it's making my arms numb. I need to put you down."

"Oh! Why didn't you say something? We can listen from outside the door now, I think," she answered. She allowed McCoy to move away from the wall before she looked down and made eye contact with the man, ensuring he was ready. In true ballet form, Ziva pushed off his shoulders with as little force as possible. Her boots hit the floor with a 'thud', though it wasn't nearly as loud as she expected. At the same time, Ziva felt McCoy's hands wrap around the base of her ribcage as he tried to slow her momentum. Coyly, she rinsed her hands in the sink and turned around to grab a paper towel out of the dispenser. Wiping her hands, she faced McCoy and looked him up and down with a smirk of satisfaction on her face. She stepped purposefully into his personal space as she moved to throw away the soiled towel. "You are not nearly as uncoordinated as you make out, Sergeant. That was very natural."

The sound of the bathroom door swinging open and then shut grabbed the attention of both cops. A tall, distinguished man with ramrod straight posture and the most horrible bowl haircut Ziva had _ever_ seen in her entire life lifted one neat, nearly black, inquisitive eyebrow. His pale, smooth face was passive and flat, but his dark eyes danced with amusement. "My apologies. I seem to have interrupted an intimate moment. I shall find a different facility to use."

McCoy's head fell to his chest. Of all the times that green-blooded hobgoblin had to pick to walk in the damned can…"Aw, hell. Spock, I know you hear this a lot, but that was not what you think."

"I am not thinking anything, Sergeant. I am merely observing," he said, his tone clipped, short, but very delivered in a sophisticated manner. He turned his head toward Ziva. "I also do not believe we are acquainted."

Ziva cleared her throat and took a couple of steps forward when she felt the pressure of one of McCoy's large hands on the small of her back. "I am Special Agent Ziva David, NCIS. We are here for a man you arrested."

"Melvin Jenkins. Yes, I'm familiar with the case. I am Spock, head of Internal Affairs for the Iowa City Police Department," the stranger replied. He pulled one hand from its previous resting place, clasped behind his back, and extended it toward the NCIS officer. "It is my pleasure to meet you."

"The pleasure is all mine," Ziva answered. From behind her, McCoy snorted loudly. She turned to glare at the sergeant as the trio walked out of the bathroom and into the hallway. "What?"

"Say that after you get to know him," he growled while he glared over Ziva's head at the taller man.

"Do I sense some tension here?" Ziva asked even though the answer was more than obvious. With her head darting back and forth between the two men, she said to McCoy, "I understand that internal affairs department is not the most popular in any law enforcement agency, but I don't think that you are the type of officer to show up on his radar."

Spock dragged his gaze away from the stare down in which he was engaged with the sergeant. "You are correct on each point, Special Agent David. Leonard has never quite warmed up to me, though I am at a loss to understand why. We have never had reason to cross paths from an official standpoint, so I find his open hostility puzzling," Spock said, his hands returning to their default position interlocked behind his back.

McCoy crossed both arms over his chest again and bristled. The hard, nearly angry expression returned to his face instantaneously when he bit out, "What if I just don't like you? That reason enough?"

Spock turned his body toward the sergeant and stepped a half a foot closer. For as much anger as McCoy's stance radiated, Spock did his best to project the exact opposite – perfect control. "You have claimed this on several occasions, and while it may satisfy some in this department, it does not satisfy me. Perhaps one day, you will be able to elucidate further on that topic."

"There you go, using all those fancy words again. Has anyone ever told you that you sound like a damned walking dictionary?" McCoy shot back, his eyebrows furrowing deeper with each word.

"Just you, Leonard."

"Dammit, stop calling me that!" McCoy exclaimed.

"Stop calling you what, precisely? Leonard is your given name, is it not?" Spock queried.

McCoy opened both palms of his hands in front of his chest. Punctuating his statements with several vociferous hand gestures, he said, "Spock, I've been around a while now, and you know it's 'McCoy'. Not 'Leonard'. Always has been, and always will be. And don't you dare try to call me Bones."

"I would never dream of it, Sergeant," Spock responded professionally, perfectly even and flat.

Ziva covered her amusement by coughing into her hand. Clearly, one of Spock's pastimes was riling up the opinionated sergeant, and she found it…almost cute the way McCoy took the bait. Ziva wondered what Abby would think of the man, should she ever have the chance to meet him. '_She and McCoy would probably get along quite well_,' she thought before she forced herself back into the dying conversation. To Spock, she asked, "What brought you up here tonight?"

Long fingers pointed in an almost balletic fashion toward Pike's door. "It is my understanding that Jim Kirk and your partner have caused some strife with Lieutenant Pike. I am here to render any assistance if necessary."

Surprising all three standing outside Pike's door, the lieutenant chose that moment to nearly rip the partition off its hinges. "Oh, that won't be necessary, Spock. I've got it all under control," the older man said before he stormed off in the direction of the kitchen.

Spock's eyebrows jumped up once and then bobbed straight back down to their standard parade rest position. "Indeed. If I am not needed here, I shall retire to my office." He extended his hand toward Ziva and shook hers lightly. "It was a pleasure meeting you."

"Likewise," she replied as he turned, executed a perfect about face, and strode off down the hall. Ziva observed silently as McCoy growled and cursed under his breath. Sidling over to him, she asked, "Why is it you are so openly hostile towards him? Spock does not seem like a bad person."

"Like I told him: I just don't like the guy, that's all," McCoy replied, still staring at Spock's retreating back.

"There must be a reason," she hypothesized. "You seem like a logical man, and it does not make sense to me that you would hate someone as much as you clearly dislike your IA officer."

McCoy's response was to gnash his teeth together while he clenched and unclenched his jaw.

"…But if you choose not to answer, I would respect your privacy," Ziva conceded, knowing that she was sunk. She filed away the information for a later time; there was most definitely a story, and now her curiosity was piqued at not having found the answer. She crossed her arms lightly over his chest and leaned casually on the doorframe of Pike's office, nearly mirroring McCoy's own stance. Ziva observed as the tenseness of his face flowed away and the hard glint parked over his eyes disappeared as he calmed down. His shoulders relaxed and his breathing returned to a normal, steady in and out instead of a staccato, random pattern.

McCoy felt Ziva's freakishly attentive gaze on the side of his face. Embarrassed, he dropped his head to his chest for the second time in the span of five minutes and scrubbed one palm over his tired face. His shoulders slumped in resignation as he realized she wasn't being rude, but instead asking natural questions based off her observations. "I'm sorry, Ziva. It's been a long day, and I'm tired. I'm not normally this much of an asshole."

"Like hell you're not, Bones! Stop bullshitting the lady! It's not nice!" Kirk called from inside Pike's office.

"I'm not the one sitting in the lieutenant's office, waiting for him to tear me a new asshole, infant," McCoy fired right back, turning his body to face the inside of Pike's personal space. "And stop eavesdropping on my conversation. It's rude."

"I can't help it if you talk loud enough for me to hear you on the other side of the wall," Kirk said with a smirk as he cracked his knuckles loudly.

"Whatever," McCoy said in response.

"Come _on_, Bones," Jim said, drawing out the second word of his sentence in exasperation. "Will you get off your moral high horse? Quit pretending you're such a saint, because I know you're not, thanks to the lieutenant who's supposed to kick my ass. I've always said you're just jealous of my greatness, and here it is again."

"Jim, why on God's green earth would I be jealous of your greatness?" McCoy asked, using quotation fingers when he said 'greatness'. "It only gets you into trouble, and that's something I prefer to avoid."

"Fun killer," Kirk quipped from his chair.

"Jackass," McCoy replied flatly as the two men turned their bodies toward one another and began a glaring contest.

Ziva rolled her eyes and, using her foot, hooked her heel around the edge of the door. She pulled her leg nearer to her body as the partition fell mostly closed. With her toe, The NCIS agent stopped the wooden door just before it hit the latch, leaving it cracked only a couple of inches. She shook her head and said, "Some days, I do not know why I put with my partner, and it seems as if you have the same dilemma."

McCoy snorted and sent one more baleful glare in the direction of Kirk. He put his hands on his hips and brought his eyes up to meet Ziva's gaze. "Sing it, sister," he quipped, putting his hand out to Ziva for a high five, a gesture she happily returned.

"Well, what now?" Ziva asked after she pulled her hand back to her side.

"Now?" he said, looking around the nearly deserted hallways. "We wait."

"Hmm. I am not very good at that," she admitted.

"Me, neither." Pursing his lips into a firm grimace, McCoy added, "But what can you do?"

Ziva chuckled and gestured with her hands. "As our partners have proven, plenty! But, we would actively participate in none of those things, since we are far smarter than that!"

"Touché, Ziva David. Touché," McCoy answered, unintentionally flashing a smile that included his full set of teeth. He saw the way Ziva's eyes lit up, and suddenly self-conscious, he dropped his head back down and stuffed his hands in his pockets.

Sparing him the uncomfortable line of questioning that would have been forthcoming, Ziva allowed the conversation to fall silent. She let her eyes wander around the barren hallways, over the reports and the bulletins as she listened to the cacophony of sounds that was a normal city police station. Sighing, she shifted her weight and found the sergeant's gaze. "Suggestions?" she asked.

He shrugged in non-verbal reply, tilting his head toward the door against which he was leaning. McCoy made eye contact and turned his head in time with hers towards the occupants of Pike's office. Using the glass paneling that broke up the solid, dark wood of the actual door, they looked in on their partners. Kirk and DiNozzo were sitting in the chairs opposite the lieutenant's desk, whispering to each other while their gazes shifted about the room. The mighty silver pen, the one that caused the ruckus, sat innocently on Pike's blotter, the ominous red end pointing like an accusation toward the men. It would almost be a perfect scene, except Kirk and DiNozzo appeared far from concerned. In fact, they were acting almost _proud_, a detail that irritated the sergeant to no end.

McCoy let his gaze slip toward the kitchen while he waited for Pike to return. He leaned up against the doorframe and smirked in Ziva's general direction. Tapping her lightly on the arm to grab her attention, he said, "I've got twenty bucks that says Pike murders them with his bare hands."

"Mmm," Ziva replied, shaking her head back and forth as her long braid swished on top of her shoulders. Mouth open slightly, the NCIS agent ran her tongue along the backs of her teeth while he contemplated. Pointing at the spectacle laid out before her, she answered, "No. Fifty says he does it with the pen."

McCoy's head snapped to his right and down, meeting Ziva's confident gaze. "You can do that? Kill someone with just the pen?"

A snort escaped her full lips. "I have killed with much less. In my line of work, we must travel lightly, and therefore, it is necessary we understand the importance of improvisation. Using the tools available is perfunctory training in Mossad."

With a bob of his famous eyebrows, the Iowa City sergeant shifted his stance. "I'll have to keep that in mind."

"So, we are on, yes?" she asked, her dark eyes alight.

McCoy stepped back and titled his head down and to the side. Scoffing as a confidently cocky smirk materialized on his face, he replied, "Lady, you bet your ass we are."

Ziva was about to open her mouth to reply when Pike brushed past the pair at a breakneck pace. "You two!" he yelled to the pair loitering in the hallway. "Get your asses in here!"

"Oh, this will be good," the sergeant started sarcastically. "My boss is pissed, your boss is about to be pissed, and we're going to be lumped into this mess with our partners. Guilt by association," McCoy stated matter-of-factly, shaking his head in disdain while he laid his hands on his hips.

"Oh, that much is obvious," Ziva agreed as she stepped foot inside the lieutenant's office. "But, at least we will have a front row seat for all the action."

McCoy let out a little harrumph of agreement as he closed the door behind him. "Hmm. I'll be damned. Never thought of it that way."

Maybe being thrown into the delinquent group without just cause wouldn't be so bad after all.

* * *

><p><strong>Next Up<strong>: It's a good thing that Gibbs is in D.C. and Tony in Iowa, because the video conference to explain just why Chris Pike is bright red is…uncomfortable.


	8. Chapter 8

**Author's Notes**: I hope everyone had a merry Christmas, Hanukkah or Kwanza or whatever other holidays I'm missing. I tried to get this story posted by Christmas, but with all the craziness (both expected and unexpected), it obviously didn't happen. But, fear not! We're reaching the end of the story here – one chapter to go after this one. This part is probably my second favorite part (right after Ziva and Bones' dinner in chapter five), and the longest of any of the chapters I've written thus far in this piece. I hope you all enjoy it, too. As always, comments are loved, but never required.

**Disclaimer**: I make my living by doing accounting, which means that I'm pretty much the furthest thing from Star Trek or NCIS' writing staff. Nothing here is mine, so don't sue me.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 8<strong>

_Washington, D.C._

While Gibbs was standing in line at Starbucks procuring his eighth cup of coffee for the day, he realized the unpleasant and sudden churning in his gut quite probably meant two things:

1. DiNozzo just did something incredibly stupid, and  
>2. Mike Franks was right (again, the bastard) when he smacked his protégé and asked him, "Probie, why the hell did you come back to this shee-it when you coulda sat your ass on a warm beach with a cold beer in Mexico?"<p>

The NCIS special agent thanked the barista, popped the cap on his coffee and humped it back to the Navy yard, just shy of double time. He flashed his badge to the security guard at the entrance and took the stairs two at a time, not bothering with the elevator. Dropping his gun and badge into their customary places in his desk drawer, Gibbs was about to reach for his cell clipped to his belt to call McGee when the phone on his desk buzzed to life.

"Yeah, Gibbs," he barked, plucking the handset from the receiver.

"Agent Gibbs, the director asked for you to join him in MTAC when you returned," Cynthia, NCIS' longtime Director's assistant informed the special agent. Having experience with the man, she was careful to keep her sentences short and to the point while maintaining a neutral tone. Her job was to make Vance's job easier, not harder.

"What does he need this time?" Gibbs tested flatly while he spun his chair around at his desk and sat down. The squeezing sensation gripping his stomach intensified, though he knew the physical reaction was in no way whatsoever related to the fact that he'd consumed about a gallon of coffee thus far in his workday without eating. Oh yes, it was turning into a _wonderful_ day. Grimacing, Gibbs counted backwards in his head while he gripped the cord of the phone tightly in his hands, waiting for the young woman's response.

Confirming his suspicions, she replied, "I don't have details further than he's requested your presence. He has Iowa City on the line right now."

"DiNozzo," Gibbs muttered before he hung up the handset viciously into the cradle of the phone, almost able to hear the director's assistant cringing through the phone line when the connection cut. He pulled the lid free from his coffee cup and took a long, relaxing swig while he willed his heart rate to a more appropriate level. Growling, Gibbs took the steps to MTAC, scanned his iris for entry, and let himself into the room.

The Multiple Threat Assessment Center was aglow with the regular technological doohickeys over which McGee regularly salivated (and that didn't make a lick of sense to him). Gibbs stopped five feet into the room, at the top of the ramp that led down to the ops area, and observed the conversation taking place before him. Vance and McGee appeared as if they were deep in concentration, McGee working the buttons and switches while the director chewed double time on the toothpick ubiquitously hanging from his mouth. Idly, Gibbs wondered how often Leon ended up with splinters in his gums from the endless supply of unique stress relief.

At the tech console, McGee was hunched over with the man running the communications board. The younger agent straightened, gave his counterpart some last second instructions and joined Vance in front of the giant screen in the middle of the room. With a nod of his head, Tim ordered the connection made, and in an instant, the rainbow-colored 'no signal' bars were replaced by the image of a scowling, middle aged, _bright red_ man in a stained grey sweater and white t-shirt, with the Iowa City PD logo visible behind his head.

Gibbs raised a contemplative eyebrow but held himself silent as Vance and McGee initiated the conversation with the Iowa City cop. Despite the red paint, there was something vaguely familiar about the man on the screen. He remembered someone with the same blue eyes as flashes of disjointed and unrelated images popped inside his head. The fact that a name was stuck on the tip of his tongue was irritating; the NCIS special agent rarely forgot a face (his keen observational skills was one of the big reasons he was such a successful team leader), but try as he might, he couldn't place him.

Tilting his head to the side, Gibbs watched as Vance cleared his throat, the director expertly hiding the smile that threatened to break out across his face by taking a sip of the coffee he was holding. Leon's lips shook almost imperceptibly as he tried to keep up the professional front he employed as the head of NCIS, but Gibbs knew him well enough to know that he was cracking the hell up inside his head.

Next to Vance, McGee wasn't fairing much better. Where Leon was able to internalize his amusement, the younger agent didn't have the political poker skills his bosses possessed. Gibbs could see it was taking every single bit of self control in Tim's body to keep from laughing out loud. McGee repeatedly looked down at his feet, purposely avoiding eye contact with the civilian counterpart on the other end of the connection, and for good reason. It wouldn't make for good relations if one of the junior agents were to burst out laughing.

Looking back at the screen, Gibbs mentally admitted that Vance and McGee had good reason to find humor in the situation. Red splotching unevenly ran all over the Iowa City cop's face and through his hair, almost as if he'd been caught at once by a dozen different paintballs. The hue ran down his neck and bled into the fabric of his t-shirt and sweater, making it appear as if he'd been shot. Gibbs silently thanked Vance's war college and Washington political experience before Leon said in the most official tone he could muster given the ludicrous circumstances, "Lieutenant Pike, I'm Leon Vance, Director of NCIS. Do I dare ask what happened to you?"

Gibbs smiled, taking another sip of his coffee when the light bulb went off over his head.

Lieutenant Christopher Pike.

Well, hot damn.

Gibbs closed his eyes and, in an instant, transferred himself back to the dusty sands of Iraq. The windy, dry desert still burned his skin, and he could still feel the sting of the sand slapping against his face. The heat radiated snaked from the sand in waves, and he could smell the sweet scent of the earth. But above all the sights and sounds that were a literal and figurative world away from the sleepy town of Stillwater, Pennsylvania, he also remembered a certain USMC sergeant named Chris Pike who had a certain affinity for pranks. Though Gibbs would never admit it (because to concede to Pike's greatness would only hasten the collapse of good Corps order and discipline), the man was the best he'd ever seen. The ingenuity and execution of a prank spearheaded by the sergeant was second to none, and Gibbs found himself routinely glad he wasn't Pike's CO. Creative discipline just wasn't the gunny's _thing_.

It only seemed fitting that, years later, Pike was receiving a little payback for all his misdeeds while he was a US Marine. Even more fitting was that it likely came at the hands of his admittedly talented but pain-in-the-ass agent. Gibbs leaned back against the frame of the door he'd come through and watched the conversation unfold.

The fact that Pike was still dyed red only diminished the man's room-filling persona by a couple of small, nearly insignificant notches. In fact, the deep crimson stain made his intense blue eyes stand out even further, and the spark within them made the man look a bit on the maniacal side. He folded his hands on his desk and glared into the webcam, speaking slowly and clearly when he replied, "You only sent two agents. I'm pretty sure you can guess which one is on my shit list."

Vance sighed deeply. In a frustrated, knowing and very resigned voice, the NCIS director asked, "Where's DiNozzo?"

Pike replied by resting his elbow on his desk and hooking a finger in the direction of a person in front of him, off camera. Several snickers were audible through the feed as DiNozzo shuffled in place, looking as guilty as a teenager just dragged into the principal's office. Gibbs laughed into his coffee cup while Tony shifted nervously from foot, moving into the webcam's view as the others continued to giggle at his expense. Recognizing one feminine laugh as Ziva, Gibbs couldn't place the other two male voices. Back on the screen, he nearly snorted out loud when DiNozzo's eyes widened, presumably when the younger man saw MTAC on Pike's screen along with the director and McGee. The senior field agent winced and let out a little squeak. Waiving lamely, Tony said, "Hi."

"DiNozzo," Vance started though gritted teeth, glaring at Tony for all it was worth. Given the man's tone, Gibbs could imagine the expression of unbridled rage on Leon's face, even though the director's back was to him. Conversely, looking at the earnest contriteness on Tony's face, the team leader was sure DiNozzo could feel just how pissed Vance was through the video feed.

The gunny let his gaze slip back over to Pike when the Iowa City lieutenant opened his mouth to reply. The lieutenant ignored the deadly expression the NCIS Director was bestowing upon his agent all the way from Washington, D.C., instead raising one eyebrow and sharply motioning to another person off screen. "Oh, no. Kirk, get your ass over here, too. You're not letting DiNozzo take the fall all by himself," he insisted in the same smooth baritone Gibbs remembered from back in the desert.

From the opposite side of the screen, the group saw another man step into frame. Younger than DiNozzo, blonde and with a cocky swagger about him that reminded Gibbs distinctly of a younger Chris Pike, Kirk didn't look concerned in the slightest bit. He hooked his thumbs into the belt loops of his jeans, leaning casually on one foot as Pike glared at both men as if they might just spontaneously combust if he stared hard enough. "Hey, everyone!" Kirk greeted, far too enthusiastically in the opinion of the three supervisors on the call. Pointing to the screen, he asked, "Who are we talking to, Lieu?"

McGee's lips were shaking in earnest as he tried desperately to hold back the flood of laughter that was threatening to burst forth. The young agent's eyes darted from Pike to Vance and back to Pike, before both Gibbs and McGee watched as DiNozzo low-fived Kirk under Pike's desk. Tim twisted in place, pretending to advise the tech of an important matter while he managed to get himself under control. Gibbs rolled his eyes; for as brilliant as McGee was with a computer, he still had much to learn in the way of people skills. "Can someone tell us what happened?" McGee asked while he cleared his throat, though the waver in his tone gave away how funny he found the situation.

Pike let his eyebrows climb his hairline. "Oh, I'd be happy to," the lieutenant growled before he launched into a bullet pointed summary of the past three hours. By the time he was finished, McGee looked both horrified and slightly concerned for DiNozzo's wellbeing. Gibbs was also sure that if he went down to special ops supply and requisitioned a set of infrared night vision goggles, he might be able to confirm that steam was indeed billowing out of Vance's ears. The director's jaw worked back and forth as he tried to keep himself from reaching through the video feed to strangle DiNozzo, and at this point, the team leader would have allowed it.

"So now that you know what, exactly, your agent has been up to while in my house," Pike said, emphasizing the 'my' in the sentence, "I would love to know where his superior is. We need to have a nice, long chat about responsibility and respect."

"Special Agent Gibbs is unavailable at the moment," Vance lied smoothly with the practiced ease of a man who played with Washington's big boys.

Pike didn't look impressed. His tone icy, he asked, "When will he be back?"

"Unknown. Special Agent Gibbs is working a case for me, one of the utmost importance," Vance replied. Still perched at the top of the ramp, Gibbs let out a little scoff at the line of pure bullshit while the director added to the lieutenant, "You're stuck with me for the time being, but I will be sure to relay everything necessary to my team leader when I see him."

"I don't buy that, Director Vance. Give me Gibbs now," the man all but ordered, his voice dropping to a deadly hiss while he talked.

If Vance was taken aback by such directness coming from a mid-level supervisor of a civilian agency, he didn't show it, and Gibbs had to give the man props for such a smooth poker face. Sipping his coffee, the director shoved one hand into the pants pocket of his slacks and replied, "I'm sorry, Lieutenant. I can make Agent Gibbs available to you when he's done with this current case, but not at this very moment."

Pike sat forward at his desk, face cold and hard, with his gaze steely. He looked directly into the webcam, allowing his voice to dip when he insisted, "I don't care if he's on the moon. Get him in here so I can tell that bastard what a pain in the ass his man is-"

Purposely dragging his heels to announce his presence, Gibbs strode confidently down the ramp and parked himself in front of the screen. Stepping out from behind the director, Gibbs flashed a smirk, let his head tick to the side and replied, "You got one part right, Pike. I'm still a bastard."

The Iowa City lieutenant had one finger up in the air, ready to flay Vance alive for spinning such an outright lie. However, when Gibbs suddenly appeared on the screen, Pike stopped completely. Eyes narrowing, Chris opened and closed his mouth a couple of times before recognition flowed through his face. Going from pissed off to openly surprised in a matter of seconds, Pike answered dubiously, "Jethro Gibbs? Holy shit!"

The sound of five jaws dropping echoed throughout MTAC.

"What the hell?" DiNozzo and Kirk shrieked, almost simultaneously. Tony stared incredulously at Gibbs. "Boss?" he asked questioningly.

Kirk's expression was a mirror image of DiNozzo's. "Lieu? What is this?"

Gibbs, nonplussed by the sudden and surprising developments, actually smiled. He took a long pull from his coffee and said, "The one and the only. How are you, Sergeant? It's been a long time."

"A long time? The last time I saw you, you were being medivaced out of the desert in a few different pieces," Pike answered with a loud snort. Giving Gibbs and appreciative once over, he added, "Looks like they got you squared away, Gunny."

"Nothing a little glue and some elbow grease couldn't fix," Gibbs answered succinctly.

DiNozzo couldn't help the snort that flew past his lips. Muttering under his breath in Jim's direction, he said, "Elbow grease," he laughed. "We needed more than that last time, Boss!"

Before Gibbs could even open his mouth to properly chastise his agent, Pike swiveled around in the high-backed desk chair and simply cocked his head to the side. The room went silent as the friendly banter between the agency's formerly acquainted bosses ceased as abruptly as a needle being pulled from a record player. Pike's eyes flicked toward the screen, the look meant to call off Gibbs off for the time being, a moment before he asked the NCIS agent, "And what is that supposed to mean, Special Agent DiNozzo?"

There was, admittedly, a minute bit of satisfaction that ran through Gibbs' frame when Tony realized the stares of every person, both in Iowa and in Washington, D.C., were leveled in his general direction as they waited for him to respond. Jackson often said that it was possible to have too much of a good thing, and in most cases, Jethro agreed with his father. But when it came to his senior field agent, he was one hundred and ten percent certain there could _never_ be too much embarrassment. It built character, and it kept Tony in check.

Well, most of the time.

Vance cleared his throat, pulled the toothpick from his mouth and rumbled, "You gonna answer the man, DiNozzo? Because I'll make it an order if words don't start flowing from your mouth in the next two seconds."

With all eyes on him, the senior agent stuttered and quickly backpedaled. "I mean, it's because Bossman's been blown up twice and he's kind of…not young," DiNozzo said, trailing off lamely as his big mouth expertly made a bad situation worse.

Gibbs growled, took the silent tag from Pike, and glared at his agent, making sure it was sharp enough to sting. He let the silence ring for a couple of long seconds before he loudly barked in his best Gunny voice, "Ziva? You there?"

"Here, Gibbs!" she called confidently, though the waver of her voice told the team leader she was doing her best not to laugh.

The NCIS team leader nodded and ordered, "Slap him for me."

"Hmm. Gladly," she replied. David stepped into the frame, and the sound of her hand making contact with the back of her partner's head reverberated through the data feed. Ziva stepped back, crossed her left arm over her chest and exhaled a light breath over the tips of her fingers of her right hand. Like she'd seen in the movies, it was almost as if she was blowing the proverbial steam off a recently-fired gun. The satisfied, proud grin on her face accentuated the point home neatly, saying with one expression what a thousand words couldn't hope to accomplish.

Tony let out a little whimper while his face froze. He brought his hand up and rubbed at the sore spot on the back of his head before he turned, contrite, toward the camera and tried to salvage the conversation. He took a breath and held up one hand in the air. "See, what I meant by that, Boss, is that the age makes you wiser and that-"

"Shut up while you're even, DiNozzo," Gibbs said icily. "Don't make me ask Lieutenant Pike to demonstrate the fighting skills they taught him in the Corps on you."

"Right. Shutting up, Boss," Tony replied with a wince. Memories of how horribly wrong the first (and last) boxing session DiNozzo ever took with his boss flashed over his face and through his mind. '_We don't teach boxing in the Corps. We teach __**fighting**_.'

With the chatty agent blissfully quiet, Pike stared at Gibbs through the webcam. "How do you do that?"

"Do what?" the gunny replied.

"Get him to shut up like that," Pike replied incredulously. His eyes drifted towards Kirk and then over to someone off screen before he added, "I've got one who doesn't have the ability to think before he talks, and another who gives me his opinion about everything, whether I want to hear it or not."

Gibbs shrugged and held his arms out at his sides. "I just threaten them. It's worked pretty well so far. Well, with the exception of DiNozzo."

"To be perfectly honest with you, Gunny, I'm not sure it would work on Kirk, either. He's too thickheaded," Pike replied with a scratch of his head. "McCoy? Maybe. Kirk? Not at all."

"Now wait just a goddamned minute. I had nothing to do with Jim's delinquency, and AGAIN, I'm being punished right along with him!" a sarcastic, dubious voice chimed in from somewhere near the left corner of Pike's office. Solving one of the earlier mysteries, it matched the tone and pitch of one of the laughs Gibbs heard earlier when the feed to Iowa City first connected.

"I really don't care whose fault it was. As far as I'm concerned, you're all dead," Gibbs replied succinctly, his tone leaving very little room for misinterpretation.

Ziva picked that moment to drop her two cents into the conversation in defense. "Actually, he is correct. We were not even on the same floor of the building when all this," she said, flipping her hand in the general direction of the pen laying on Pike's desk, "all happened, so it would not be fair to blame us for what has gone wrong tonight."

Pike raised one eyebrow, and in a steady, even tone, he said, "No, you two were just hanging out in the bathroom next door, trying to listen in on my conversation with Jim and Tony here."

Despite being firmly entrenched in the doghouses of both Gibbs and Pike, Kirk and DiNozzo dissolved into another fit of snickers while McCoy sputtered unintelligently. The NCIS team leader watched as at least one of his agents managed to maintain a shred of dignity; Ziva's eyes simply widened. It would have been imperceptible to anyone but those who knew her best, but given her training and control, the small gesture was akin to Tony yelling out loud.

Sitting back in his chair, Pike's eyes met Gibbs' through the feed. The gunny nodded once before Chris pulled his eyes back towards the quartet in his office. Looking directly at Ziva and McCoy, he said, "Nothing wrong with my hearing, you two. Remember that next time."

Narrowing his eyes, Gibbs though he heard the man Pike identified as McCoy mumble something about a sock. "What was that?" he called loudly over the feed. "You lost your sock?"

"No, I said, 'Goddamned Spock'!" A tall, dark haired, well built man stepped into frame in profile as he made his point with Ziva. "Now do you see why I don't like him? That bastard ratted us out!"

Ziva ducked her head, contrite, before she replied with a sigh, "Well, we _were_ spying."

McCoy's eyebrows descended into a deep crease that stopped right between his eyes. He grumbled, "Christ, I'm surrounded by goody two-shoes," as he looked around the room.

Jim, still gleefully happy and leaning up against the edge of Pike's desk, tossed out, "See, Bones? I do have my advantages. At least I'm not a dirty snitch."

McCoy pursed his lips and slowly nodded his head. "You might be an irritating pain in my ass, but you're not a snitch, no."

"Aww! I didn't think you loved me, man!" Jim said, diving toward the scowling man while he tried to envelope him in a massive bear hug.

McCoy grimaced and pushed Kirk off. "Jim, heel. I know we haven't let you out of your kennel to run off all that excess energy today, but it wouldn't kill you to at least _try_ and act like you're a professional."

"Good luck with that," Pike snorted out.

A ripple of laughter ran through both MTAC in D.C. and Pike's office in Iowa City as every person digested the absoluteness of the lieutenant's statement. Vance gave Gibbs a quick nod, tossing his coffee cup in the garbage before he turned towards Tim. "Come on, McGee. I think they've got it under control here. I've got something I'd like you to take a look at on my computer, if you don't mind."

McGee's mouth flapped open and then closed, just barely cutting off the protest about to tumble off his lips. He looked instinctively at his boss, and receiving Gibbs' approving nod, set his jaw against the obvious disappointment washing over his face. In a confident and strong voice, Tim replied, "Okay, Director." He dutifully followed Vance out the door, sparing one quick glance over his shoulder that Gibbs pretended not to see.

Back on the screen, the NCIS team leader narrowed his eyes while he watched the wheels inside Jim's head turning. Though Kirk seemed to be proverbial loose cannon, he was also obviously very observant, and Gibbs wasn't sure if that should scare him or comfort him. The blonde man straightened from where he was leaning against Pike's desk and shoved past a very indignant McCoy. He hit DiNozzo on the arm and said, "Come on, man. I think they're done with us. Let's roll."

Well trained, DiNozzo looked to Pike for confirmation that he was, indeed, dismissed. The two marines both scoffed simultaneously at Tony's first (and probably only) display of adherence to military decorum for the night, and again at the owlish expression plastered all over his face when he realized he was asking for permission. Pike half-smiled, nodded his acquiescence, and made a little shooing motion with his hand. Tony was up and out of his chair in a flash, following closely on Jim's heels. "Hey, Kirk! Wait, man!" he called down the hallway.

Ziva stepped out from her small space tucked behind Pike's desk and next to the giant file cabinet. Her hands linked in front of her, she lifted her eyebrows at the lieutenant as she walked by. "I will keep him in line for the remaining duration of our stay here. You have my word. If that means I must tape him to a chair, that is what I will do."

"Hmm," Pike replied, tapping his index finger against his lips while he slouched gloriously in his chair. "Duct tape's in the supply closet, if you need it. Use a lot, and make sure you cover his mouth. You have my permission to do the same to Kirk, too."

"Deal," she replied, chuckling deeply.

With her usual gracefulness, Ziva floated out the door of Pike's office while Gibbs snagged a wireless headset from the rack near the tech console. He activated it and affixed it over his head in time to hear his Iowa City counterpart ask with a long-suffering sigh, "Did you ever do anything with that list of rules you were working on back when we were in the desert?"

Gibbs snorted. "Hell yes, I did. I use 'em to teach my people what they need to know."

Pike smiled fondly. "Shannon's idea, if I remember correctly."

"They were," the gunny answered confidently. "I always told you that she was the brains of it all."

"No surprise there. How many are you up to now?" Pike asked.

"I've got fifty-one and counting."

Nodding his head, the lieutenant laid the index finger of his left hand over his mouth. He pulled at the neck of the still-stained sweater and said, "I think it's time to add number fifty-two to the list."

Smiling from the corner of his mouth, Gibbs dropped his head and kicked at a piece of dirt stuck to the drab, brown carpet. He lifted his eyes to the screen and hazarded his best theory. "Never leave DiNozzo and Kirk in the same room, alone, ever again?"

"I'd appreciate that," was Pike's deadpanned, flat reply.

From the corner of the room in Iowa, Gibbs heard a loud snort over the audio feed from a forgotten person tucked out of camera's line of sight. A sarcastic, irritated and distinctly southern drawl coated the gunny's ears like molasses. "You'd appreciate that?" the annoyed man started. "_You_ don't have to put up with Kirk. You pawned that job off on me."

"Which you accepted when you took the stripes, McCoy," Pike fired right back, without so much as even a pause for breath. Scrunching up his face, he pointed one finger at his officer. "And furthermore, I told everyone to leave, and that included you."

"No," McCoy proclaimed loudly and vehemently.

Pike lifted an eyebrow at nearly the same moment Gibbs did. The gazes of both men were steely and unwavering. The lieutenant let his voice dip before he replied, "No, what?"

"No, I am not leaving. I've known you a long time, Chris, and I think it's only fair I finally get to hear some confirmation of what an annoying bastard you were. Are. Were. Something."

Pike allowed his expression to go flat as he reached for a towel and a bottle of rubbing alcohol, allowing McCoy to stew silently. Dumping a healthy splash onto the cloth, he began to wipe at his face. Little patches of naturally colored skin finally began to show through as the towel turned varying shades of pink to red. Finally finished with his right cheek, Chris looked up and replied innocently, "And what, exactly, would that be, McCoy?"

Gibbs snorted loudly and answered without thinking, "Try that you're a devious, hypocritical son of a bitch, that's what!" Sobering, he added, "Though if DiNozzo tried to talk to me like that, I'd kick his ass from the Navy yard to Afghanistan and back again for even thinking about the word insubordination."

Pike sighed deeply and ran his hand over his still half-red face. He motioned with his hand lazily and pulled on the chair next to him. "Len, come here," he said in a much less officious tone.

The dark-haired objector Gibbs saw earlier dropped into the chair next to the lieutenant, a smug, triumphant smile on his face. Chris rolled his eyes as McCoy stuffed his hands into the pouch of his battered, worn Ole Miss hoodie and motioned to the screen. "Gunny, this is Sergeant Leonard McCoy, my former partner of seven years and now my training officer for the shift. Len, Gunnery Sergeant Jethro Gibbs, NCIS."

"Pleasure," McCoy quipped, giving Gibbs the quick once over with his eyes. Appreciative, some of the suspicion faded from his eyes while he sat back in his chair. With a jerk of his thumb in Pike's direction, he added, "I'd shake your hand for putting this guy in his place, but I don't think that'll work too well."

"Given the circumstances, I think we can consider this a handshake," Gibbs replied. He shifted his eyes to Pike and said, "I was wondering why you were letting him walk all over you like that. Should have said he was your partner. Would have made more sense to me."

Pike laughed out loud and hypothesized, "You were ready to jump through this video feed and PT his ass into the ground for that, weren't you?"

"I admit the thought crossed my mind."

"See, now that just ain't right. I'm the one who's managed to stay _out_ of trouble, unlike my infant partner and your irritating agent" McCoy informed Pike and Gibbs, rolling his eyes as he allowed his Georgian drawl to thicken considerably.

"Tonight," Pike replied quickly with a snort. "You stayed out of trouble tonight. But you keep testing me, and I won't hesitate to publically go over each and every time you didn't walk the straight and narrow. You forget it goes both ways, McCoy - I know plenty of those stories, and I'm not afraid to tell them."

Pursing his lips, McCoy stared resolutely into the screen, at Gibbs. Pointing one finger in Pike's direction, he said, "Do you see what I have to put up with? He's an insufferable bastard who thinks the bars on his shoulders always make him right."

"I got news for you: he's always been like that, even when I outranked him," Gibbs replied as he took a moment to study the new addition to the conversation. He was much younger than the NCIS agent expected, though McCoy seemed to be every bit the cop his service jacket proclaimed him to be. Most definitely a lead-by-example type of a guy, his bearing was confident, but not cocky, unlike the vibe Gibbs pulled from Kirk. Nodding satisfactory, Gibbs addressed Pike while he pointed toward McCoy. "At the risk of giving him a bigger head, it seems like your eye for people extended past the Corps, Pike."

Pike shrugged, glanced over his shoulder and propped his feet up on his desk. "I do my best."

"So how does that explain Jim?" McCoy growled lowly, turning his head to glare daggers at his commanding officer.

Chris replied by scoffing loudly and rolling his eyes while he relaxed into the back of his chair. "Some days, it goes better than others. We'll call Kirk my one momentary lapse in good judgment and leave it at that."

"Jim is not a 'momentary lapse' in judgment. He is a pain in my ass," the sergeant retorted.

"That, too," Pike replied right before he narrowed his eyes. "But it seems like Kirk's rubbing off on you, considering everyone else took the hint to vamoose."

"I don't follow the pack," McCoy replied, confirming Gibbs' suspicions. "I told you I wanted to hear a story or two, and I think I've earned the right for reasons that start with 'Jim' and end with 'Kirk'," he concluded. McCoy crossed his arms over his chest and let his face fall stony, flat and resolute.

"Fine," Chris acquiesced after a few seconds while his brain churned out all the possible scenarios of how it might be a bad idea to tell McCoy anything about his past. "One story. That's it. And then you get the hell out."

"I can live with that," McCoy replied.

Shaking his head, Pike added, "I wasn't finished, McCoy." He motioned emphatically, finger tapping the blotter on top of his desk. "The deal is you sit down, you shut up, and the moment you walk out that door, you forget everything you heard in this room. Are we clear?"

Raising one eyebrow nearly to his hairline, Len fixed his former partner with a gaze that would have caused lesser men to wilt. "What?" he snorted. "And give Jim more idiotic ideas that result in mountains of paperwork? Hell, no. It'll be forgotten as soon as I walk out the door."

"You'd be wise to do that, Sergeant. Your boss was good at pissing off the brass. Turns out they don't take too kindly to things blowing up near their offices, even if a safe zone," Gibbs informed McCoy nonchalantly, dangling the proverbial carrot.

The little tidbit of information had the desired effect as one eyebrow scaled McCoy forehead at the same time he leaned closer to the camera. "Really, now?" he said, rather rhetorically. Turning to his boss, McCoy added, "You know, I always thought you were just an older version of Jim, and this is just going to confirm it."

Conversely, Gibbs watched as Pike dipped his chin and smiled guiltily as the tips of his ears and his nose went a little pink. "Okay, so I might have been a little bit of a pain in the ass when I was in the Corps. I liked to have fun. What's wrong with that?" Pike exclaimed, unused to the feeling of being on the bottom of the proverbial hog pile.

"With an MRE bomb?" Gibbs asked succinctly.

"You put what in your cup?" McCoy asked as his voice pitched up. "What in the blue fuck is an MRE bomb?"

"Exactly that. A bomb, made from MREs," Pike answered quickly and vaguely.

Confusion danced around McCoy's face as he tried to make heads or tails of his lieutenant's short, incomplete and completely bullshit response. It was amusing to Gibbs to watch the thoughts parade across the younger man's features; he correctly guessed that not much tripped up the opinionated sergeant, and the foreign feeling of uncertainty wasn't sitting well with the man. Finally, after a few moments of contemplation, McCoy admitted defeat with, "In English, Chris? I have to memorize enough damned acronyms to do my own job, and I refuse to learn more just to hear what annoying idiot you were. What's an MRE?"

"It's a Meal Ready to Eat, or how the military guarantees you won't shit right for a week," Chris replied, his comment pulling a snort of agreement from Gibbs.

Skeptically, McCoy's eyebrow climbed higher up his forehead, something that the NCIS agent found both amusing and slightly disturbing. The Iowa City sergeant's voice dipped when he asked, "And you make a bomb from this? Please tell me we don't just give explosives to our soldiers in food form."

"We're Marines, McCoy, not soldiers. And we can make a bomb from anything. Resourceful overkill is our specialty," Pike said proudly, something that earned a gravelly 'Ooh-rah,' from the gunny.

Gibbs clamped down the smile that was threatening to overtake his face as McCoy's expression melted into one of slack-jawed open horror. "It's easier than you think," he started off before the Iowa City cop could launch into any kind of meaningful protest. "MREs come with a heating pouch and some chemical powder so you don't have to eat it cold. You take the powder, stick it in a plastic bottle and add water. When they mix, the reaction creates gas, and it eventually blows up the bottle."

"What did you decapitate with this little stunt of yours? Because I can see it ending about five thousand different ways, none of which were good," McCoy asked through narrowed eyes.

"Only his own freedom and food choice for a week," Gibbs answered for Pike.

"I was playing Russian Roulette with it right outside the command post," Chris admitted while he picked away at some of the red dye nestled under his fingernails. "I don't know why the colonel was so upset. It was just a window I broke, not anyone's head."

"_Just_ a window? You're insane, Pike."

"Funny, that's what the colonel told me, right before he tossed me in the brig and confined me to bread and water rations for the week," Pike retorted with a smile. He switched his focus to Gibbs when he added, "Besides, it was worth it. Won me a case of beer I drank as soon as I was free."

Gibbs watched as McCoy's head slowly turned towards his boss' relaxed, nearly vainglorious posture. When Pike refused to show anything resembling contriteness for his transgressions, the Iowa City sergeant dropped his head into his hands rested his elbows on his knees. "Jesus Christ. All right, look. As soon as the phones are back on, I'm calling Maury to have your and Jim's DNA tested. There's nothing short of a negative result that's gonna convince me you're not related."

Pike stopped, stared quizzically at McCoy and after an uncomfortably long pause, threw back his head and laughed. It was long and loud, and straight from his belly. The length only caused his subordinate's eyebrows dip harder between his eyes and his growl deeper as he cursed his boss to hell and back. The lieutenant eventually calmed himself enough, wiped the tears of mirth from the corners of his eyes and said, "My intentions were good, the plan was solid, but something went a little bit wrong in the execution," he said with a passive shrug of his shoulders. "In retrospect, I think I might have been a little overzealous with the number of heating packets I used, but it was still a good way to pass the time."

Shaking his head in earnest, McCoy vaulted his frame up and out of the chair next to his commanding officer. "You know what? This was a stupid idea. I don't need to know," he said, looking down at Pike, the latter not even bothering to try and contain his laughter. "Jesus, and here I thought your idiocy only extended to the time you locked yourself in the back of your squad. This? This just smashed that record into little, tiny smithereens. You and Jim can go be morons together, but I want no part in it."

"I think it's a little late for that."

Growling, Len shook his head and turned on one heel, inadvertently executing a perfect about face. He took two brisk steps toward the door and laid his hand on the door handle. McCoy was two seconds for freedom when the sound of Pike's voice stopped him.

"Oh, Len?"

McCoy visibly stiffened. He braced himself and squared his body around to face his CO's. "What?" he spat.

Chris dipped his chin and raised his left eyebrow marginally. "It's snowing too hard right now for you guys to go home. At this rate, it'll take you three times as long to get there and back, and it's not worth winding up in a wreck because of it. I want you and Kirk to stay here for the night."

"I'll make it home just fine. I've driven in worse weather than this while I'm on duty in a rear-wheel drive car," McCoy retorted, rolling his eyes as he pulled open the door.

Pike pursed his lips while he let his head fall to the side almost imperceptibly. The sounds of the station washed in through the crack in the partition and it made the audio sensors in MTAC momentarily hiccup, but the lieutenant's voice cut through the din. "Let me rephrase that, Sergeant," Pike began, using McCoy's rank to grab his full attention. "You and Jim are not going anywhere tonight. I can't afford for either of you to get hurt in an accident, or to be stuck tomorrow and unable to report to roll."

McCoy saw Pike's eyebrow and raised one of his own. "You have other cops who can handle the shift."

Chris shook his head and let his chin fall even closer to his chest. He stared at McCoy long and hard while his gaze drifted toward the chair DiNozzo was previously occupying, and then to the spot where Ziva stood. After a few long seconds of pointed staring, Pike lifted his face up and tilted his head to the side while he silently communicated with his sergeant.

McCoy's formerly raised eyebrow dropped like a rock, his dark brows creasing on top of the bridge of his nose. "You want me to _babysit_ them? Oh, hell no! I might be a lot of things, but that's not one of them."

"What, exactly, do you think you do all day long? You're a public babysitter. Why should this be any different?"

"I can shoot the ones that threaten my well-being on the street," McCoy growled while the right corner of his mouth turned upward in a vicious sneer.

"Oh, for Christ's sake, Len, you're not going to shoot them, and this isn't such a bad assignment. But if you want to keep acting like a five year old, by all means, go ahead. My next step is to make it an order. Do I need to go that far, Sergeant?" Pike said, crossing his arms over his chest while his eyes dared McCoy to contradict him.

The Iowa City sergeant's face fell. "No," he mumbled. McCoy picked up his head and stared his boss down. Louder, he added, "But I'm doing it under protest," before he practically stomped out the door to Pike's office. Chris shared an amused, sympathetically mutual look with his counterpart in D.C. before he resituated himself in his chair. "Now, where were we?"

"I'd normally argue that my agents don't need babysitters, but given the circumstances, I don't think that argument would hold water," Gibbs quipped over the video line as he gestured toward the patchy, blotchy red spots still littered across Pike's face and neck. "Still, I think you scared him."

Chris watched McCoy's silhouette hang a right turn outside his door. Shaking one finger defensively at Gibbs, he shifted in his chair and said, "You encouraged it too, Gunny, so don't pretend like you thought telling him about me was a bad idea."

"Nah! I would never do such a thing," he said sarcastically, eyes flicking away from the screen momentarily. As a distraction, Gibbs drained his coffee and tossed the empty cup in the garbage near the tech console, all in one fluid motion.

"Somehow, I think that's a load of bullshit, Special Agent Gibbs," Pike answered smugly, not buying the clear diversion.

True to form, Gibbs sniped back a one sentence reply that completely changed the tone of the conversation. "No more than your reaction to Kirk and DiNozzo."

The lieutenant let out a low grunt and dropped his chin to his chest. Scrubbing a hand through his hair and cursing when red flecks of paint fluttered down to his desk like snowflakes, Pike leaned on his elbows and smiled. "That didn't fool you, huh?"

"Not a damned bit."

He sighed. "Guess I must be slipping."

Gibbs tilted his head to the side and snorted to the negative. "Nah, Chris. Someone has to put the fear of God into guys like Kirk and DiNozzo every once in a while."

"That's what I have McCoy for." At Gibbs' incredulous expression, he added, "What, do you think I keep him around just for his personality?"

"No, I thought you would have kept him because he seems like a damned good cop, under all that bullshit," the gunny replied in his usual, no-holds-barred way.

"There is that, too. Len's a good cop and a better guy, but it's hard to get to know him. Kind of like someone else I knew back in the day," he said with a poignant glance in Gibbs' direction.

"I was the practice? Glad I could help, Pike."

Chris shifted in his chair and tossed the soiled rag in the garbage can next to his desk. "But we still have business to discuss, as much as I've enjoyed this chat."

"Jenkins," Gibbs supplied. His bearing shifted from a man simply catching up with an old war buddy back into the NCIS MCRT team leader. "I need him, Pike, and I don't think I have to tell you that my federal jurisdiction trumps your state."

Pike opened his mouth to protest out of ingrained force of habit, but closed it before he actually said anything. Gibbs narrowed his eyes suspiciously; the Chris Pike he knew wasn't shy with his opinions, though they didn't come out as sharply as they'd flowed from his civilian sergeant. He waited for Pike to say what was on his mind with a sense of foreboding. When the man was _that_ quiet, bad things often followed. "Cat got your tongue, Sergeant?" Gibbs asked, addressing Pike by his military rank in hopes it provoked some kind of instant response.

"I was just thinking of something that might be mutually beneficial for both of us," he replied after a beat.

"What's that?"

"I'll give you Jenkins, but you have to agree that DiNozzo and David go with him. I want those two the hell out of my city, and more importantly, the fuck away from Kirk," Pike ordered as he leaned in to the screen and pointed one finger towards Gibbs.

"That's all? You got yourself a deal, Lieutenant."

"I mean it, Special Agent Gibbs. I want them gone as soon as the snow clears. Tomorrow morning. First light. I'll sign the transfer paperwork right now." Chris reached over into the file basket just off screen and pulled out a piece of paper. Taking out his trusty custom made .308/30-06 nickel plated pen, he scribbled his name on the transfer form in the correct boxes and stuck it ceremoniously back in the folder. He pointed the business end of the former bullet at Gibbs and said, "God help you if DiNozzo does anything else stupid, because I will rip up that paperwork and toss him in my jail instead."

Gibbs barked out a couple of long, genuine laughs. The sound of happiness coming from the otherwise surly agent shocked the hell out of the tech at the communications console. The man quickly re-acquired his sights on the panels with one well-placed glare from Gibbs. "If that happens, keep him. You have my permission."

"Noted," Pike answered. Softening his facial expression a bit, he said in addition, "Nice talking to you, Gibbs. If you're ever in Iowa, call me. We should catch up."

"Likewise, if you're ever in D.C. Take care of yourself, Marine," Gibbs ordered before removing the headset and motioning to the tech to cut the connection.

Now he _really_ needed another cup of coffee.

* * *

><p><strong>Next Up<strong>: Much to the relief of Pike and McCoy, Tony and Ziva depart, but all is definitely _not_ as it appears.


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's Notes**: Happy national hangover recovery day, everyone! I'm pleased to say that we've reached the end of the story. (Well, this story, anyway.) I hope you all have enjoyed this ride as readers as much as I've had fun as a writer. It's always been my goal to entertain people, and while I know I'm certainly not the best writer out there, if I've made you laugh or smile at some point during this piece, I know I've done my job. Before you all ask, yes, there will be a sequel to this piece, but I just don't know when. I have a couple other things I want to write in this 'verse before I start tackling that one.

I also want to say thank you to all of you who have supported and cheered as I wrote. Your kind words have been encouragement as my family has dealt with a couple of significant crises over the past month or so. It's been really nice to see the comments and alerts in my inbox, especially when I needed a break from the insanity that has been my real life. As always, a comment, whether you loved it, were indifferent about it, or thought it was the worst piece of shit you've ever read, would be appreciated. Thanks so much, you guys! Enjoy it!

**Disclaimer**: I am poor, so therefore I don't own Star Trek or NCIS, or anything else cool you might see in this fic. I own only the plot and a few of the crazy OCs.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 9<strong>

_Iowa City, Iowa_

"I hate to say it, but I think we might be close to the end of Scotty's movie collection," Jim said, allowing his voice to fall just a couple of notches. With his back toward the room's three other occupants, Kirk dug and scrounged through the nearly empty bottom drawer of the mechanic's desk. He mumbled to himself as he tossed out the few remaining DVDs over his left shoulder, not bothering to watch as they skidded to a halt adjacent to the TV.

From underneath a hefty pile of blankets and pillows strewn over Scotty's Crown Vic bench-seat-turned-couch, a muffled, "Praise the Lord," leaked out. The stack of furnishings started moving slowly, almost as if it were a caterpillar trying to crawl uphill. The shimmying continued unabated for a few more seconds until a dark head of hair and two bloodshot green eyes poked out from under the blankets, near the armrest. McCoy fixed the back of Kirk's head with a contemptuous glare before he hissed, "Maybe now I can actually get some sleep!"

Oblivious to the optical lasers being leveled at the back of his head, Kirk held up one hand in the air and corrected his partner, "No, I said we were nearing the end, not that we actually found it. There's a big difference, Bones. It'd be a dark day when we exhausted all of Scotty's movies. I'm just saying I think we're reaching the end of the ones we can all agree on." Jim surfaced with two choices in his hand, hopping up off the floor and trotting back over toward the couch. He held up his finds while he asked the room, "How about Blade?"

"Blade!" DiNozzo replied enthusiastically, his eyes lighting up at the prospect of yet another movie. "You can't go wrong with Wesley Snipes, even if he's a half-breed vampire!"

McCoy groaned loudly and covered his face with his forearm. He rubbed at his eyes with the pads of his fingers before he lifted his head off the couch and searched for Ziva's eyes. "Ziva, remind me again when our partners de-aged themselves."

An inelegant snort escaped the NCIS agent's lips while she sat ramrod straight in one of the bucket chairs opposite the couch. McCoy's copy of _Dead of Night: A Zombie Novel_ dangled loosely from her fingertips as she half-paid attention to the conversation swirling around her. Turning the page with positively zero fanfare, she scoffed, "That would imply they grew up in the first place."

"Good point," he replied, letting his head fall back onto the pile of blankets behind his neck. Turning toward his own partner, McCoy wiggled his arm loose so he could point one menacing finger at Kirk. "And you. There'd better not be a speck of glitter on those vampires, or so help me God..." he growled, allowing the threating sentence to trail off into nothing.

DiNozzo's hands stilled in his lap. Smirking appreciatively, he nudged Jim's forearm and said, "Wow, he knows what Twilight is. That's a start, at least. Our boss is a lot more clueless than that."

"Gibbs is not clueless, Tony. He just knows what is important and what is not," Ziva corrected.

"Actually, you'd be surprised how much this old guy knows about pop culture," Kirk said with a jerk of his thumb toward the lump of humanity hiding under the blankets. "I mean, I call him Bones because I caught him-" Jim started to say before a shiny, green and silver projectile tumbled end over end from the vicinity of the couch, striking the patrol cop squarely in the side of the head. A dull thud was audible throughout the room, and a little bit of residual liquid squirted out from the former can of Mountain Dew and landed in Kirk's eye. With a curse, he rubbed the sore spot on the side of his head, and exclaimed, "Ow! Man, what was that for?"

"Not another goddamn word, Jim, unless you feel like you're ready to find out what it's like to eat your meals through a straw for the next six weeks."

"Well, that's one way I guess he's not like Gibbs," Tony quipped as he watched the exchange.

"No, Gibbs would not have said anything. He would have simply shot you, Tony," Ziva, not bothering to look up from her book, reminded her partner.

"And that's exactly what I'm going to do to you two if someone doesn't shut off that goddamned noisemaker!" McCoy glanced down at his watch and then up again towards Jim. "It is 0800, and I am not at my house, I am not in my own warm and comfortable bed, and most importantly, I am _not_ sleeping!"

Kirk rolled his eyes right before he waved his hand dismissively. "Bones, you slept through The Rock. _The Rock!_ Sean Connery? Nicholas Cage? Ed Harris? Bad-ass mother fuckery? Big explosions? That's a crime right there."

"I'm with Kirk on this one, McCoy," Tony said. "What you did was almost sacrilegious, and I thought physically impossible to do with a Michael Bay film."

"Oh, forgive me," the sergeant drawled sarcastically. "I didn't think I needed to actually watch the movie with you two next to me, quoting the damned thing line by line."

"Bones, Bones, Bones," Jim scolded. "Even Ziva stayed awake for the entire show. You're losing your man points here."

Staring blearily at his partner, McCoy said, "Jim, I have been awake for more than twenty four hours, thanks to you and your new friends. I am tired of being yelled at, I'm exhausted, and I want sleep. So go. The hell. Away." To accentuate his point, the sergeant grabbed the end of the blankets, gave them a hard snap and allowed them to ruffle dramatically like a parachute falling to the ground. He pulled his head under the falling fabric and cocooned himself inside, effectively blocking out the rest of the conversation.

From the doorway, Pike's deep, rich voice cut into the conversation. "Oh, come on, McCoy. They're not that bad."

"Christ on a cracker, not you, too." Swearing loudly, McCoy threw back the covers and heaved himself upright. His shoulders slouched down and his spine curved gloriously while he rubbed at his tired face. Along with the hearty scowl and awful posture, the red rimmed, bloodshot, fatigued eyes only made the normally serious man even more cartoonish. The sergeant's hair was sticking up in staunch defiance in seventeen thousand different directions in the most prolific example of bedhead on record. McCoy growled at the snickers being shot in his general direction. At the same time, he tried in vain to smooth his porcupine-esque coif as he pointed emphatically at the two younger men sitting in his vicinity. To Pike, he questioned, "Can't you make them go away?"

"Nope, sorry." Pike asked cheekily while he sauntered into the room. He spun Scotty's rolling desk chair around backwards and dropped into it. Chris used his feet to propel the wheeled piece of furniture over toward the group while he leaned his forearms on the top of the backrest. "They're your assignment, so they're not going anywhere."

"Have I mentioned recently how much I hate you all?" the sergeant shot back before he pushed himself off the couch. Sticking his head under the emergency shower Pike insisted Scotty install in case of unexpected explosions, McCoy pulled the handle and allowed some of the water to drip over his head. He smoothed back his now soaked hair, cursing when some of the icy wetness ran down his neck and soaked the collar of his shirt. He trudged back over to the couch, sat down, crossed his arms over his chest and glared at his former partner. "You've made this a sport. You and Jim, tormenting me. It's some sort of sick, twisted game."

"Actually, I do it because I can. Perks of the bars," Pike replied, reaching out and snagging a handful of pretzels from the dish on the coffee table. He tossed them into his mouth and asked, "Did you children have a good night?"

"No," was McCoy's reply.

"Yes," Tony and Jim said at the same time.

Pike's head ping ponged back and forth between the two very opposite reactions given by the three men in front of him. Kirk and DiNozzo couldn't have looked more pleased with themselves while McCoy was busy being as annoyed as his counterparts were thrilled. Chris tucked in a laugh before he said, "Well, you're all still alive. That's all that matters at this point."

"Why are you looking at me, Lieu?" Kirk exclaimed, holding his hands out in front of his chest. "Glare at my partner and his new assassin BFF. Do you even want to know what they spent their night doing?"

"Probably not, but I'm sure you're going to tell me." Pike smirked and raised an eyebrow when his mind rewound and replayed Jim's previous sentence. "And was that intentionally dirty, Kirk, or just me?"

Jim's entire body, in motion through the conversation, suddenly stilled. "That wasn't what I meant, but we were wondering where they actually went when they claimed to have gone to dinner last night. I smelled bullshit," Kirk replied, motioning with one hand toward a smiling DiNozzo.

Chris' eyes flicked over just in time for him to catch the tail end of a nice, proper blush making its way across McCoy's face. He noted, with a small measure of relief, that DiNozzo was at least heeding the warning signs that was the icy stare Ziva was leveling at him. "Really, Kirk? And how is that?"

"Come on, Lieu. I might be young, but I'm not dense. Do you see how they're acting?" Kirk insisted, waving his arms at Bones and then towards Ziva. "My partner smiled at her. He _smiled!_ I saw it. I didn't even think his face had those muscles, let alone the ability to use them!"

Ziva, still sedately reading her borrowed book, responded to Kirk's charges before McCoy could utter one obscenity. "I hardly think you lieutenant will blame me if I preferred to spend my night with someone who could actually hold an intelligent conversation."

"Touche, Agent David," Pike said with a low, appreciative whistle. He reached over and smacked Kirk on the arm. "She got you there. Can't argue with that logic."

"I do my best," Ziva replied with a small, dangerous smile.

Kirk, watching the exchange while his jaw dropped in half-inch increments, was incredulous. "This is not fair. You're all completely ignoring the issue here."

Pike stared at Jim as if he was inspecting a new recruit at first turn out. With his eyes boring holes into the younger man, he asked, "What did she do?"

"She gave him ninja skills!" Kirk nearly shrieked, pointing manically at Ziva.

"Ninja skills? What the hell kind of term is that, Kirk?"

"The one that involves my partner learning how to use a letter opener as a throwing knife," Kirk pouted back almost petulantly.

"I don't see how that's a bad thing to learn," Pike replied, mentally knuckle-bumping McCoy when a sly, proud expression broke out across the man's face. "You never know when you might need to use it."

"Yeah, but then they went hand-to-hand. Or, hand-to…whatever," Kirk stated, relishing the second embarrassed expression to pass across McCoy's face in as many minutes.

The sound of a rumbling diesel engine pulling up outside the door interrupted any reply from the assembled crowd in the room, and probably kept Kirk breathing for the time being. Pike watched the sergeant chew on the inside of his lip as he counted backwards from ten to keep from pummeling his loveable but irritating partner. Quickly filling the silence and thereby avoiding World War III, Pike pointed towards the outer door and said, "I think that's your car, Agents DiNozzo and David."

"How'd you get it out so fast?" DiNozzo questioned as he tore his attention away from the conversation to squint at the bright, white snow reflecting off the glass from the single window in Scotty's Lair of Doom. "It was pretty well buried."

"Yeah, well, here in the Midwest, we're used to it. We don't panic like you babies do in D.C. when a little bit of the white stuff shows up," Pike sniped back proudly.

"How many favors is this gonna cost us?" McCoy asked with an irritated grumble, wondering just what part of his soul Pike had to trade in order to get the NCIS car bumped to the front of the line after such a ferocious blizzard. "Hell of a lot of 'Get out a speeding ticket free,' days, and I'm not paying."

"Relax, Len. No one's paying anything. I told them I had a set of NCIS agents that had a material witness they needed to get back to D.C. on the double, so the driver popped the car to the top of the list." Chris reached into the pocket of the hoodie he borrowed from Kirk and pulled out a folded set of paperwork. Pushing the chair forward, he stood to his full height while he tossed the stack of red tape on the table toward Ziva. "That's your transfer paperwork for one Melvin Jenkins, releasing him from our custody and into yours. I've signed it, and as soon as you get him from the jail, you'll need to ink it, too. Now, get the hell out of my station, Agents DiNozzo and David, and I mean that in nicest of ways."

Ziva and Tony didn't need to be told twice. As soon as Pike was on his feet, both NCIS agents stood with him, shaking the man's hand. Ziva thanked him politely for his hospitality and for his officers, and Tony at least had the good grace to apologize for turning the man red. In a surprise move, Pike simply smiled, slapped DiNozzo on the back, and walked out the door.

A flurry of activity encompassed the next few minutes after Pike's departure. The pair ran around the Iowa City police station in search of any wayward belongings while the tow truck driver unloaded their car in the garage. Thanks to military precision, the process of actually cleaning up after themselves took much less time that should have been logically expected. Bags were packed, lists were checked, and everything was running right on schedule. The efficiency was a welcome surprise to McCoy, who walked back into Scotty's office to find Ziva picking up a few spare pieces of trash that fell on the floor during the night. He looked on the couch and saw each blanket he used neatly folded, the chairs pushed in and desk left in its normal state of entropy.

"If I didn't have the pictures to prove it, I might actually believe the last twelve hours of my life was just a dream," he said while he lurked silently in the doorway. "It looks like you guys were never here."

Ziva's hands paused for an eye blink before she resumed her task of checking under and on top of things for any possessions belonging to her or DiNozzo, or for any excess trash that was missed the first go around. "Tony always makes a mark wherever he goes. It is inevitable."

"So do you," McCoy replied frankly before he could truly stop and think about what he was saying. He mentally kicked himself for such open-ended ambiguity, running his hand through his freshly washed, still-wet-from-the-shower hair as a nervous distraction. He coughed into his hand before he added, "Just not in the way your partner does," with a hefty cringe.

"Hmm. I hope not! It is my intent to keep NCIS in good standing with the various law enforcement agencies around the country, not to alienate them."

Shrugging, McCoy shoved his hands into the pockets of his dark blue, surprisingly fashionable jeans. "Well, I'm pretty sure that I can speak for Lieu when I say that you're always welcome back here, Ziva. Just do us a favor and leave DiNozzo at home, will you?"

Ziva stopped her work and leaned up against the edge of Scotty's giant workbench. She picked away at some imaginary dirt under her fingernails and said, "And leave Tony unattended at our office? I think not. He requires…supervision, as you discovered."

"Isn't that what you have Gibbs for?" McCoy quipped cheekily.

"It is my intent to see that Tony has a babysitter, not someone who would outright murder him. As annoying as he can be, he is a very good investigator, and a very good agent, not that I would ever tell him that." She paused, looked down and added hesitantly, "And, he is a good friend. He has helped me on many occasions when I most needed it."

"If you ever repeat this, I will deny it to my dying breath, but you two make a good team. Gibbs was smart when he paired you up," McCoy admitted while he shifted nervously from foot to foot. "You guys need each other. You're effective. I can see that."

"There are days I wonder, but for the most part, you are correct. I would not ever admit that, though. Tony's head is big enough as it is!" Ziva exclaimed with a wave of her small hand.

Tilting his head to the side, McCoy smiled out of the corner of his mouth before he took a step closer towards the NCIS agent. "Aww, look at that. You do care about him."

"As you care about your partner," she replied without missing a beat. "I promise to keep your secret if you will keep mine."

McCoy cleared his throat uncomfortably and pondered her suggestion for a moment before he nodded and said, "Sounds like a fair deal. Where do I sign?"

"On my ass, Bones!" Kirk yelled, not at all concerned at what he'd interrupted. "You're already kissing Ziva's, so you might as well make it official! Well, official in the sense that you're going to tell us where you two were doing the squelchy when you were supposed to be at 'dinner'," Jim said, using quotation fingers while he brought up the pair's impromptu trek to Ribisi's the night previous.

The sergeant groaned loudly and pinched the bridge of his nose. He took a deep breath and held it, letting it out slowly to a five count. McCoy muttered under his breath, "Lord above, give me the strength not to murder him with any of the skills I learned last night."

"Don't do that. It would not be wise, and I do not wish to be party to another murder in a police station." A mischievous smirk broke out across Ziva's face when she looked up and registered that her statement stunned the sergeant, slack-jawed and openly horrified, absolutely silent. Pulling the book she borrowed from McCoy's locker out of her pocket, she slapped it hard against his chest. "Thank you for that. It helped pass the time."

McCoy fumbled with the small paperback when it was unceremoniously shoved into his hands. He righted the title so it was face up, tucking the volume into the back pocket of his jeans for the time being. He leaned down and reached for the green straps of Ziva's sea bag and tucked it carefully into the trunk of their car. "All set."

"You know, when I tried to do that, she kicked me in the stomach," DiNozzo quipped as he walked fast by the pair, adding his own bag to the trunk. Tony slammed the lid shut and spun in a half circle, leaning up against the bumper of the car. "What's your trick, man?"

"Respect," McCoy grumbled back.

Kirk snorted. "Respect? Yeah, that would be a first."

McCoy whirled around on one heel and shoved an irritated finger in Jim's face. "Respect due a lady, Jackass. Though with the way you screamed over Lucy, maybe I should be treating you like one."

"Dude, would you stop bringing up that slithering, creepy, nasty pet of yours? What person in their right mind thinks that it's cool to keep a snake? People have dogs. Some people even have cats. A hamster could even, in extreme cases, be considered acceptable. But a snake? Hell, no!" Kirk ranted away. "There is something wrong in your head, man."

"There's something wrong with _my_ head? Pot, meet the damned kettle," The sergeant snorted loudly. "You are playing with fire, Kid. I'll burn you, and you know it."

"Try it," Jim answered, puffing out his chest and stepping closer to his partner.

"How about we simply say we did and avoid the actual fisticuffs?" Ziva asked, placing one hand in between Kirk and McCoy before an all-out brawl could actually get going. She pointed towards the doorway as a distraction. "Our prisoner is here, and we would like to get going. Right, Tony?"

"Huh?" DiNozzo asked, responding only when his partner's hand made contact with his side. "Right, oh yeah. We should go."

In a prison-issued orange jumpsuit, Melvin Jenkins shuffled through Scotty's office with Marcy Jordan at his side. The gregarious CO kept a firm grip on the man even though he was handcuffed and shackled. She waved a friendly hello to McCoy and Kirk before introducing herself to the NCIS agents. "I think I have some riff-raff for you," she said jovially.

"Riff-raff about sums it up," Tony answered, scribbling his name on the transfer paperwork before he offered it to Jordan to do the same. With a cheesy smile, he waited patiently for the jailer to remove her cuffs and shackles before pulling his own from the pouch hidden at the back of his belt. Tony stepped around to Jenkins' side, and pulled the man's hands behind his back. The familiar motion of cuffing a suspect hitched midway, and Tony titled his head to the side as he regarded his newest catch. "If I cuff you in front, are you gonna play nice?"

Jenkins pursed his lips while his jaw clenched at Tony's apparent condescension, but he nodded once in the NCIS agent's direction to the affirmative. "Yeah," he said simply.

"Good!" DiNozzo exclaimed as he slapped the cold, hard metal on to the man's wrists. He cranked them down tightly and squeezed his charge's shoulders. "Ready to head back to D.C., Melvin? There's a very anxious U.S. Attorney who was heartbroken you stood her up on your last date."

Jenkins simply scowled while Tony pressed down on his head, encouraging the man to step into the car. He pulled his feet in wordlessly while DiNozzo slammed the door shut in his face. Shaking his head, the man sat in the back seat and seethed, watching the NCIS agents as they collected their coats.

"I think it goes without saying that if you are ever in Washington, you should, how do you say it? Look me up?" Ziva said to McCoy.

The sergeant laughed. "I'll do that, Ziva. Take care of yourself, you hear?"

"Likewise," she replied. The pair reached out and shook hands, and Ziva felt McCoy tense and then relax in the span of half of a second when she pulled him into a brief hug. Leaning on the open passenger door, she patted him gently on the cheek, relishing the shy smile the small gesture pulled from the stoic man. Ziva slid into passenger seat of the car and allowed McCoy to close her door for her as she pulled on her seatbelt.

On the other side of the car, Tony and Jim were exchanging something that resembled a handshake. To his new friend, Kirk said, "It's been real, man. Drive safe back to the airport."

"Oh, that won't be a problem," DiNozzo answered while he stuck one foot in the foot well of the car. "I'm driving."

Jim reached out and knuckle bumped DiNozzo. "I hear that. Peace out, and hit me up sometime. I'd love to hear how this all shakes down for you."

"You got it, Kirk. Don't get shot," Tony said, pulling on his aviator sunglasses as he started the engine. "Later, brother!" he called out the window.

McCoy chewed on the bottom of his lip while he watched the Crown Vic roll out of the garage and disappear into the harsh, barren white landscape of Iowa City. Turning to Jim, he crossed his arms over his chest and said, "You and I need to have a little talk about appropriateness."

Kirk rolled his eyes and slapped McCoy on the bicep. Deadpanned, Jim shook his head and asked his partner, "Bones, for a man who got laid last night, you are _really_ cranky!"

The entire station heard McCoy's response, and quite possibly the genesis of Kirk's demise. "FOR CHRISSAKE, JIM, IT WAS ONLY DINNER!"

* * *

><p><em><span>Outside Iowa City, Iowa<span>_

"Do you have any idea where we are, Tony?"

"We're in Iowa. That's where," DiNozzo replied, twisting his phone around to study the map application on his handheld device. He squinted at the screen while he struggled to figure out which direction was north. "We're, uh, here," he said lamely, pointing at the little blue dot slowly worming across his cell phone.

"You know, I've been here for a while, so I actually know this area pretty well," Jenkins piped up from the back seat in an attempt to be helpful.

Ziva rolled her eyes and snatched the phone from her partner's hands, completely ignoring their captive. "Tony, your orienteering skills are useless! There is really only one way back to Cedar Rapids, and this is via the road we are on. You don't even have to turn, so I fail to understand how this can be so complex."

Tony gripped the steering wheel tighter while he focused on the piles of white snow stacked on either side of the road. He shook his head and said, "It's not complex, it's just boring. There has to be shorter way!"

"Yeah, I know a few of those!" Jenkins reiterated from behind the invisible line dividing the naughty side of the car from the nice one.

Waving her hand in the air towards their charge, Ziva turned her head and smiled. "Be careful. You are coming dangerously close to whining."

"I'm not whining," DiNozzo began while he adjusted the seatbelt in his own version of a nervous tick. "DiNozzos don't whine. I was just stating a fact."

"You were whining," Ziva responded after a beat, laughing through her statement at her partner as she held up a finger in Tony's face. "Besides, it snowed nearly two feet in a day. We are lucky the roads were clear enough to allow us to leave."

"I was not whining," Tony practically pouted, ignoring the last part of his partner's observations.

"I hate to say it, Agent DiNozzo, but you were whining," Jenkins affirmed with a sly smirk that nearly matched Ziva's. He leaned forward from the bench seat and rested his elbows on the backrests of the front seats. Shaking his handcuffs, he shot a pointed look toward Tony. "A little help here?"

Tony peeked in the rear view mirror. "Oh, sorry. My bad." He shifted in his seat, lifting his butt a few inches up off the cloth upholstery. He snagged his keys with his fingertips and, with a smooth motion, tossed them into the back right next to their prisoner.

Jenkins let out an approving grunt and reached for the keys. He flipped through the ring to the tiny skeleton key and greedily jammed his find home into the hole carved into the cuffs locked around his wrists. The metal bands clicked and ratcheted, falling to the floor with a dull 'thud'. Melvin rubbed away the soreness at the base of his hands while he reached down and plucked DiNozzo's handcuffs from the floor where they fell. Twisting them expertly closed, he handed both the cuffs and the keys to Ziva. "Did you have to put those things on so tight? Jesus, I couldn't feel my hands!"

"Sorry, man," DiNozzo apologized. "It had to look authentic. People were watching."

"I know, but that doesn't mean it still didn't hurt!"

"You're a big boy. I know you'll get over it, Melvin." DiNozzo turned and met the man's dark eyes. "Or should I call you Agent Francis Saunders?"

In the back seat, the convict-turned-federal-agent shuddered dramatically. "If I never hear the name Melvin Jenkins again, I'll be happy. What idiot came up with that when they decided to throw me under cover?"

Tony smiled genuinely when he answered, "That one was Fornell's fault. Blame your boss."

"I would, if I thought he wouldn't kill me if I tried. Still though, at least I don't have your boss," Saunders supplied lightly while he shuddered involuntarily. "I think Gibbs can kill people with his gaze alone."

"It's his superpower. One day, we're going to figure out how he does it and then patent the technology. It would make us _millions!_" DiNozzo exclaimed.

"Which is exactly what you're going to need when Gibbs fires you for not getting your job done, Tony. And I, for one, do not wish to break in a new partner. You were hard enough," Ziva cut in impatiently. "We still have a job to do."

In the back, Saunders cracked his neck back and forth. "Yeah, we do. All right. Focus."

"Tell us what you have," DiNozzo started, switching from immature frat boy to seasoned, skilled investigator in about a half second flat.

"We were right. Iowa City is business central, and there's a lot more than we originally thought going on here," Saunders said gravely.

Tony and Ziva's mouths flattened out at almost the same time when the pair took into account the FBI agent's tone and trepidation. "In what way?" DiNozzo asked.

"Your sailors, the ones bringing the drugs in, are in bed with a handful of local cops."

"Melissa Schmidt?" Ziva queried.

"Yeah, how did you know?" Saunders asked, confused.

"Lucky guess," she replied while she exchanged a glance with Tony. Images of the twin expressions of unbridled fury on both Kirk and McCoy's faces splashed in front of her eyes while she waited for Saunders to continue.

"Basically, it's a two-pronged assault. The Navy brings the drugs in from foreign ports, and they get it to Iowa for distribution all over the upper Midwest. Their protection is Schmidt and three other cops. They're the muscle behind the operation," Saunders began, taking a deep breath when he started speaking. A certain tenseness buzzed through the interior of the car as he said, "They allow everything to move, and they're pretty good at weeding out the competition. And, it seems like most of the department knows she's dirty, because they won't touch her with a forty foot pole."

"It appears we have some work to do with this department," Ziva said, mouth set in a grim, straight line.

"What did you think of Kirk, McCoy and Pike?" Tony asked, hoping that Saunders' answer was one of positive nature.

"I didn't get any bad vibes off them if that's what you're asking, but you guys got to spend way more time with them than I did. From what I hear on the streets, though, those three are popular. Good cops – tough, but fair."

"Clean?"

"Yeah, clean. I've been here for a few months now, and I've found no indications to the contrary," Saunders confirmed.

Both Ziva and Tony let out the breaths they were unconsciously holding in. "That is good to hear. It would not have been my idea of fun to arrest any of those men, as I did not get the feeling that they were dirty, either."

"Rule Number Ten, Ziva," DiNozzo warned lowly. "You're getting awfully close to that line."

The former Mossad officer shook her head. "I know Rule Ten, and I was not getting that personally involved! I merely enjoyed Leonard's company, that is all," she insisted, not able to make eye contact with her partner.

Tony laughed. "Right, and that's why you're using his full first name when no one else does, and why you gave him your personal phone number on a business card inside that zombie book your borrowed from him," he said, noting with a small hint of pride the way her head snapped toward him, shock written all over her delicate features. "Did you really think I'd miss all of that?"

Ziva gaped like a fish for a second before she composed herself and said, "No, I did not think that you saw that.

Saunders' head shifted back and froth from Ziva to Tony. "Does someone want to tell me what's going on here?" he asked hesitantly.

"No!" the two NCIS agents yelled back in unison.

"Okay," he said. "Just asking. No need to bite my head off."

Ziva bristled, pulled at the hem of her jacket and stilled her hands in her lap. She turned to face Saunders and said, "I must apologize. It has been an incredibly long night, and I am a little…cranky."

"Apology accepted. After spending a couple of nights in the jail, believe me, I don't take offense," the FBI agent responded, reaching out to accept Ziva's outstretched hand. "I imagine that if we're going to be working together on this thing, there's going to be some disagreements. Might as well get it out of the way from the word go."

DiNozzo looked over his shoulder and made eye contact with Saunders. "You ready for this, rookie? Because it's about to get real."

"I'm in a little deep to back out now, DiNozzo."

Tony scoffed to the affirmative before he plucked his cell phone from the holster clipped to his belt. He balanced it on the steering wheel as he scrolled through his list of contacts. Finding the right one, he hit send and put the call on speaker. "Fornell, we've got your man. What do you want us to do with him?"

'_Bring him home. We've got one hell of an op to plan_.'

Tony looked over at Ziva and then into the rear view mirror at Saunders. He licked his lips in anticipation before he replied simply, "Roger that."

**-FIN-**


End file.
